Thor

While driving today I found my first movie promotion soda can on the side of the road.  It is a Dr Pepper Thor can.  I went to the Dr Pepper website and found there are six cans in the Thor collection.  How much effort will I put into completing the collection?  I'm not sure.  We don't drink much soda in our household, so I doubt we'll be buying the cans.  And how hard will it be to find them all in this area?  Do they only release certain cans in certain parts of the country to make it hard to collect?  Only time will tell.

Thor - Warriors III - Sif

June 20 Update - I just received the sixth can in my Thor collection, I am finished with that!  Here's how the collection process went:

* Can 1, April 17 - Thor (Dr Pepper) - I found it on the side of the road
* Can 2, April 30 - The Warriors III (Diet Dr Pepper) - I found it on the side of the road
* Can 3, May 21 - Sif (Diet Dr Pepper) - An antique shop we visited had a fridge with sodas for sale, I saw the Sif can which I didn't have yet and paid $.75 for it
* Can 4, May 31 - The Destroyer (Dr Pepper) - I found it a block from my house on the side of the road
* Can 5, June 11 - Loki (Cherry Dr Pepper) - I made an eBay purchase where I got to pick which 24 cans I wanted from the seller's collection, so this is one of the cans I chose
* Can 6, June 20 - Heimdall (Cherry Diet Dr Pepper) - That same eBay seller finally put a Heimdall can up for sale, so I bought it from him to complete my collection

The Destroyer - Loki - Heimdall

Whew!  Although I didn't put a whole lot of effort into completing the collection, I'm not interested in trying to complete another movie tie-in any time soon.  Oh wait, I just bought the first Captain America can two days ago.  Here we go again...

Combat Cooler

I have had this can of Combat Cooler lemon drink since the early 90's.  It was given to me by a friend in the National Guard for my meager can collection at the time.  Unfortunately, all of my other cans from that time have either been thrown away or lost, this is the only one that has survived.  In fact, until today, the can was still full.  I have adopted the practice of emptying all of my cans to prevent any kind of leakage in the future that could cause problems during storage or while on display.

For all these years, I thought it was just a novelty item sold at the PX.  But now I have done some research online to see what the story is behind this drink.  Although information is scarce, I was able to find out a little bit about it.  A 1991 New York magazine article mentions Combat Cooler Corporation was releasing carbonated electrolyte replacers in the form of orange and lemon-lime Thirst Quenchers in camouflage cans.  Bingo!  So this was an actual brand of soft drink.  There is even a Combat Cooler commercial on YouTube.  I also found a pictures of Combat Cooler Cola and Orange.

So although it must have been a relatively obscure product, it was a real brand after all.

My First Can (This Time Around)

I started collecting soda cans a few times while growing up.  I had a couple of brown paper grocery bags full of cans when I was a teen, but they got pitched.  I had a set of four crazy Pepsi cans from 1990, they are now missing.  For some weird reason, when I see soda cans from the 70's and 80's I think of my childhood and growing up. 

For the last week or so, I have been tossing around the idea of collecting as many different soda cans as I can.  But do I want to commit to something like that?  Will I lose interest and have a couple bags of cans just taking up space in the garage?  Where will I get the cans if I attempt this?  Our family doesn't really drink soda.

My first can

At work this morning I decided to go for it after seeing the half-empty Diet Pepsi can that has been sitting on top of the water heater for a couple of years.  I think it got a hole in its side from the soda machine in the break room and when someone bought it, they set it on the water heater to wait for it to quit squirting.  And there it still sat! 

After cleaning the can up, I set an immediate goal of having 100 different cans, a long-term goal of 250 cans, and a life-long goal of 500 cans.  Which of those goals will be my limit?  I should be able to hit the first goal but the second goal will take quite some time.  And 500 cans seems near impossible unless I just buy a bunch, but I have no intention of doing that.

The hole in my first can

So, by far the prettiest or rarest for my first can, it is nonetheless what has started it all again.