5-hour energy — why did I just drink that?

Advertising has a funny way of working on people. After a while, you see so many of the fucking things that you finally just give up and buy the product. The thought process goes something like, “Why won’t they shut the hell up. It’s not going to work. I’m never going to buy their shit. Maybe they know I’m never going to buy their shit. Maybe that’s why I keep seeing their ads. It’s only $2.99? Oh, fine. Shut the hell up. I’m buying it, I’m buying it….”

So, I bought a bottle. Actually, two, because Gremlin tried some. What the hell. We were out buying donuts anyway, right?

After careful consideration [read: “How much is this shit again?”] I decided on the NEW! Orange Flavor, because none of the other bottles had a flavour listed, and I couldn’t imagine anything worse than opening up one of these and finding out that the natural flavour resembled a combination of feet, ass and ground up tylenol with a base of seven year old off-brand Tussin. Because what the hell else is something made out of Niacin, Folic Acid, a couple of B vitamins, a touch of Sodium, Taurine, Glucuronolactone, Malic Acid, N-Acetyl L-Tyrosine, L-Phenylalanine, Caffeine, and Citicoline going to taste like? Certainly not the ‘purified water’ they claim is one of the ‘other ingredients’.

Gremlin’s smelled and looked a bit like green KoolAid, which…I’m thinking was lime, except that it tasted like grape…which is extremely upsetting. So, yeah. NEW! Orange it is, then.

Opening the Bottle

You practically need an energy drink just to open the damned thing. First, you have to slice open the heat-shrinked plastic wrappy stuff that is the label, which should be made easier by the perforation, except that it’s not perfectly aligned. And then the bit around the cap gets in the way, because you think you’re making progress, except it’s just the plastic turning, and not the cap.

When I finally got the cap off, I was a little disturbed by the strange brown crusty substance on some of the bottle’s threads, but since they obviously hadn’t reached the upper part…I ignored them. And, besides, the plastic bit was all sealed, so it can’t possibly be anything bad, right?

…it smells like KoolAid again. Orange, this time. With a hint of Sunny Delight.

Unfortunately, it tastes like neither of those things.

It tastes like aspartame and regret — two things that aren’t on the ingredients list. There’s Splenda, which, in my experience, has a aspartamey taste.

I think I’ll, uh, save the other half of the bottle. Yeah. For later.

Maybe I’ll pour it into a cup and see what it really looks like….

One thought on “5-hour energy — why did I just drink that?

  1. This is why I’m always wary of ‘energy’ supplement-type-thingies. Anyone who’s ever failed at downing a caffeine pill on the first try knows that all things meant to make you go faster taste horrible. Same goes for failing at downing a b-complex on the first shot.

    Coffee is the only thing I’ve ever found that functions as a wake-me-up and tastes halfway decent most of the time.

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