You would think, with all the news the stuff's been making on a daily basis since a company registered here in Las Vegas began selling it two months ago—"Cocaine is it" (defamer.com, Sept. 17), "Latest buzz is in a can" (New York Post, Sept. 19), "Lawmakers scold maker of Cocaine" (New York Times, Oct. 3)—that it would be easier to get a hold of. But that just ain't the case. Had to go down to Southern California, where you can obtain anything with relative ease, from bootleg DVDs to social diseases. First place I went was 7-Eleven. The man behind the counter said, "Huh?"
"Cocaine," I said. "Never heard of it?" He called his manager, saying, "This man here wants to buy the Cocaine."
The manager emerged from the back office. "Don't you watch the news? We pulled that off our shelves a month ago."
And so I went down Ventura Boulevard, to an EZ Market. There I finally got my hands on some. By then I was practically fiendin' for the stuff.
Because I had to see what it was all about. I mean, I know if the media blows up something these days, it must be really, really important. CBS aired a segment on the liquid stuff last week. Fox News did in October, as did our local Fox affiliate in Las Vegas. MSNBC, twice in the past two months. This is some hot stuff here. I was revved up.
I mean, I'm no different from any other American consumer: I take the energy drink company at its word when it says "Instant Rush. No Crash," and "Possible feelings of euphoria," or when it describes itself as the healthy alternative to the illicit street drug. I anticipated something earth-splitting to occur with my first sip. Or, at the very least, life-changing.
Didn't happen. I got three cans, popped the lid on the first, drank it, and then started writing this account (oooohhhhhh: watch out now!). Perhaps it's because I'm a chronic coffee drinker, and for all the hype Cocaine gets (doctors have come out on all forms of media and warned to keep kids away from this stuff, for they might get hooked; the company producing Cocaine, Redux Beverages, boasts that one can of their product has more than three times the caffeine that the industry-leader, Red Bull, has), the drink still has less kick than a large cup of joe from Starbucks. The 18 grams of simple sugars didn't affect my body, which had been made impervious by Halloween weekend, and if there was a superdose of vitamin B in there, as the label states (some 600 percent more than a normal person requires each day), I didn't notice. All I felt was a little gurgling in my belly and the godforsaken aftertaste of cough medicine on the back of my tongue.
And, of course, an uncontrollable urge to do the real drug. Now I can see why lawmakers have come out against it. I can see why the mayor of New York urged Cocaine's removal from store shelves, saying that we don't need products "that glorify something destructive." (Hell, pretty soon we'll start putting anorexic girls in prominent places in beauty magazines, celebrities smoking and boozing at parties on the entertainment channels or Paris Hilton just about anywhere.) I can see why the company has been relegated to advertising strictly on its own website and MySpace page. I can see why Redux's owners, James Kirby and his wife, Hannah, have been on trial by media since they came out with the stuff. It's dangerous, man. It makes me want to find my next, better hit—like actual cocaine. Moreover, it inspires me to tell kids to do the same.
Hide them. The kids. Reports are, the drink Cocaine is coming to Vegas this month. Opponents of the energy drink have drawn a direct hypothetical link between the name of a consumer product and a rise in minors doing drugs. It makes perfect sense. Kids are stupid.
But really:
Now that I've tried Cocaine myself, I certainly don't endorse it—the stuff blows, and it tastes like shit—but I can now say one thing to the energy drink's political opponents stirring hype around the product, including this article here:
Grow up.