The Land of a Million Flavors & Grapico

Well, we've entered the land of a million flavors - of soda! Alabamians love their fizzy drinks! I have been perusing the aisles of the grocery stores and have found that old soda pops didn't die out - they stayed alive and well in the old south.

I have been enjoying something called Diet Grapico this week - found at Walmart here and made in Birmingham. It's a very decent grape soda, something I really like and can never find in Florida. There was also Sundrop (similar to Mountain Dew) and the icky sounding Peach Nehi (where's the grape, people). There were at least four versions of fruit punch soda sold in cans. I always liked Tahitian Treat when I was a kid. Oh, and some weird version of Dr. Pepper, I think called Dr. Wham. I'll have to try that one next time - perhaps Diet Dr. Wham (does George Michael drink this?)

My paternal grandparents ran an old fashioned country store in rural North Carolina when I was growing up, so these soda flavors bring back memories of drinking a lot of them there. I haven't seen them since - until now.

Well, due to sugar issues, I can't indulge like I used to when I was small and thankfully, the children don't like soda (they've always said fizzy drinks were "spicy" since they were babies). But happily, the oddly-named Diet Grapico is on my shopping list now. The photo is an old advertisement for Grapico I found when searching for more info about it. It's one of those old, old brands of the south.