2016 Holiday Cans

I got my first two 2016 holiday cans this week.  The rest are soon to follow...

LASER Focused Energy

Another weekend, another one-day road trip.  This time I headed west and checked out several flea markets and junk shops I've never visited before.  And this is some of what I found:

Did you notice?  They are all beer cans.  I imagine collecting beer cans is different than collecting soda cans.  There are so many more beer cans out there that it's easier to find them, but then it might be harder to find the specific ones you need. 

Finally I stopped at a Big Lots store and found a 5-can set of Laser energy drinks.

Sucky pic

I tried to get a pic of the cans in the trunk and the Big Lots sign in the background, but it didn't quite turn out.  So here's a better pic.

These cans of Laser energy drink claim to be the world's first energy drink without a hint of caffeine!  That's a pretty big claim.  They replaced caffeine with rhodiola.  A quick Google search says rhodiola is a traditional Chinese medicine and Scandinavian herb touted to promote physical and cognitive vitality.  But how does it taste?

This batch of cans contains peach mango tea, fruit punch, orange, "original", and sugar-free "original."

It's too late today for me to try one of these, but I'll check it out the next time we're having a busy day at work and see if I become more focused.  At only $.50 a can, it's worth a shot.

To Be Recycled

My dad rode a stretch of road just outside of town today on his riding lawn mower pulling a small trailer.  He was able to pick up this many cans.  I looked through them to see if there were any I needed for my collection, but they were mostly beer cans.  No luck.

I was recently given a can crusher to tackle the mountain of bags of cans to be recycled in my garage.  I planned on doing a post on that project today but I ended up being gone all day.  

I've had people bringing occasional cans of bags to me for a year or longer and it's about time to cash them in to see if it's worth it.  As soon as I do, I'll post about it.  

Maybe there's money to be made in can collecting after all.  haha

Pennsylvania Dutch

A few months ago I posted about the cans I found at  a nearby Amish store.  My parents went back to that store recently and found some birch beer.

The brand is Pennsylvania Dutch.  The label boasts that this birch beer is made from an old Pennsylvania Dutch recipe, hence the brand name.  Doing a Google search, I learned that birch beer is made with herbal extracts usually from... birch bark.  But back in the colonial days it was made with oak bark.

I've never tried birch beer but I'm told it's like sassafras, which I've also never tried.

The label design is so fancy that at first I mistook it as an alcoholic drink.  Beer cans often have great looking labels.

I may have to crack this one open soon.  It looks like it could be a real thirst-quencher on a nice fall day like today.