Cokesuckers

Yesterday I went to the new Lowe's story by my house. It's right next to the new Wal-Mart, which is next to the new condo housing development going up. It's been a busy summer for construction near my house. I spotted one of my neighbors, who now works at Wal-Mart, outside the store, taking a break.

I've never know this young man's name, even though I've lived up the street from him and his family for a couple of decades. What I know is that he and his twin brother are what would be called mentally-challenged, special education students when they were in school. They are in their thirties now; one of the twins works, but the other one doesn't. I assume the working twin is higher level than the other.

What I know about the family is that they all seem somewhat challenged, and they have an addiction to Coca-Cola products. I saw the Wal-Mart employee twin drinking a 20-oz bottle of Diet Coke. His stomach protrudes with what I'd call a Cokebelly. When I drive by their house and their recycling can is out for pickup, I notice it is bulging out of the top with plastic Coke bottles of all sizes. Sometimes I see the more low-level twin walking home from the dollar store in the other direction, laden with a plastic grocery sack full of Coke products. These folks just really love Coke.Occasionally I buy a soft drink, but no one at Coke, Pepsi, or any other soft drink company is getting rich off me. What I see around me are a lot of people who are overweight, with big mugs of soft drinks in their hands. A couple of coworkers of mine might toss down the equivalent of a six-pack of Coke a day. They not only have Cokebellies, but a lot of other body fat to go along with it. I believe these drinks are helping make people in America into the most grotesquely fat people in the world. You don't have to be mentally challenged to drink Coke, but people are mentally challenged if they drink it all day and wonder why they can't lose weight.