Pop off

This morning as I was getting ready, I was gulping down the last few sips of Diet Pepsi, only to have some miss my mouth, dribble down my chin and onto the front of my shirt. Sadly, this is a common occurrence (damn you, wide-mouth cans!)

The incident got me thinking about my love affair with carbonated beverages. I have been a pop junkie for about 15 years. It all started with Mountain Dew, an addiction that lasted from age 14 to 23. After graduating college, those calories started to catch up with me, so I switched to Diet Pepsi and Diet Sierra Mist (yes, I am loyal to the Pepsico brand), addictions that lasted from age 23 until this year.

Over the past year I've been slowly making the transition from pop to coffee. I just got tired of attending work meetings and feeling like a 12 year old with my can of soda while every else sipped coffee. Basically, pop = teenager. Coffee = fancy-pants grown up. Now, I refuse to ever be a coffee-house-frequenting, wanna-be intellectual (which, by the way, = college freshman), but I am happy to take one more step toward adult-hood. The big 3-0 is on the horizon, so it's about freaking time.

The only problem with this transition, though, is that coffee didn't actually replace pop. Instead, it sort of became a soda supplement. I still consume about 1-3 cans of pop a day. Mostly, in the form of diet, caffeine-free beverages, but still. Over the past 15 years, I've probably put about 10 Pepsico executives' kids through college.

So, I'm quitting. Tomorrow. We ran out of pop today, and I'm just not going to buy anymore. Twelve packs of soda have gotten quite expensive lately — about $4.50 each. I go through two a week. That's about $470 a year. Not a lot, but no small change either.

Even though I'm not giving up caffeine (something I've considered many times), I have a feeling I'm going to go through some withdrawal symptoms anyway. But if I can make it a month pop-free, I think I have officially kicked the habit. I'll be sure to report on my progress here regularly. And just for good measure, I'm going to keep track of my weight throughout the process. Caffeine is an appetite suppressant, but according to some studies, artificial sweeteners can make you eat more. So maybe I'll lose weight. Or maybe I'll gain.

Regardless, I'll burp a lot less.