Mmmmm. It's not a Slurpee[tm], mind you, but it's not bad. And it wasn't long after that, back in NYC, that Franny grew so desperate in her search for that elusive, true Slurpee[tm], that she felt compelled to freeze her Snapple[tm] (cf. The Utopia Parkway Diner). So, what we're trying to say here is: we understand.

Submitted by Eric Ragnar Willis Rice (er12@midway.uchicago.edu):

I had the ideal form of the slurpee two days ago. My brother and I were on our way back home from the video arcade where we had just finished jacking up our nervous systems with some controlled doses of Killer Instinct. As we are wont to do, we decided to stop at the 7-11 on the way home and pick up a couple of slurpees. Nothing washes down that video game adreneline quite like the "juice." But little did we know that we were about to experience the greatest slurpees 7-11 has ever manufactured. We filled our cups as usual with wild cherry flavor, of course. We paid the pimple-faced attendant and out the door to the car. Half way home, I turn to my brother and say, "Fuckin' A. This is the best damn slurpee I've ever had."

"No shit dude," came his natural reply.

"When the genius who invented the slurpee brought the slurpee before the board of directors at 7-11. This is what the slurpees were like." I continued.

"No shit. Do you think that the same guy who invented the slurpee also invented the slurpee spoon-straw? Or do you think it was some child genius who thought it up?"

As we contemplated this question we became more and more overwhelmed by the perfection of the slurpees we were consuming. They were in that perfect stasis between ice and liquid. The ideal toward which every slurpee machine strives for once had been achieved. It was thick, but never got clogged in the straw. The syrup flavored every last bit of ice, never separating into that runny puddle of red at the bottom of the cup. No two slurpees before and no two slurpees ever again will achieve this level of perfection. We had achieved slurpee nirvana. Psychic bliss.

...An experience such as this needs to be shared....While most will never achieve this sense of oneness with a slurpee, that two did is an achievement and should not be ignored.

Well, here I am, writing a piece for the great Net 'Zine, Utopia Parkway. I honestly have no idea why I'm writing this, except that... it tastes good. Not the article, what's IN the article.

I'm sure you've all had something commonly known as a Slurpee (tm), Slush Puppy (tm), or, on the Simpsons (c) as a Squishee (tm). If you haven't, go have one. Or follow the cheap -n- easy instructions below.

Well, I stumbled across a way to make your own Slurpee (tm), Slush Puppy (tm), or Squishee (tm).

It actually started at about 10 AM on August 13. I wanted a COLD Pepsi to go with my three Border Lite Bean Burritos for breakfast. Well, as it turns out, all I had was WARM Pepsi. ROOM TEMPERATURE Pepsi. Uck. So, what's to do? Obviously, put a can of Pepsi in the ice maker's ice cube repository thing. Well, I forgot about it. It's now about 2 PM on August 13. I remembered it.

When I popped open the top it started fizzing and spurting like Mount Vesuvius, except killing less people and covering less cities with ten feet of ash. It just kind of dribbled on the counter, actually. This stopped about a minute later. I tried AGAIN to open the top, but it wouldn't.

Sigh. I was about to chuck the Pepsi but I remembered... WE HAVE A CAN OPENER! A few twists of the hand crank later, I had the lid off of the can. This was great! I had a little bit of ice crystals at the top, kinda like snow. Take a spoon, or a spork if you prefer, and eat that off. Mmmm.

Well, after getting through about the top half-inch, it was... GOOD! Like REALLY COLD PEPSI! Kind of... STIFF Pepsi. It was truly a great experience. Now, I'll leave this as an exercise to the reader. Find out if ALL carbonated drinks do this. I'm already trying Diet Coke, Diet Dr. Pepper, and Coke Classic. So you can't do those. In particular, I'd like to know if Hawaiian Punch, root beer, cream soda, that Life Savers drink, and Mello Yello do the same thing.

This kind of reminds me of a thing one of my physics teachers used to do. I don't think it was an experiment or anything, I think he just thought it was fun. He'd get some shaving cream in an aerosol can, and dunk the thing in liquid nitrogen for a minute or so. He'd take it out with some tongs, and somehow cut off the metal case. He'd be left with this wonderful cylinder of shaving cream... WITH THE AEROSOL GAS TRAPPED INSIDE IT. As this heats up, it expands. A LOT. He once froze a couple dozen of these and put them inside a colleague's trunk on a hot summer day. It, of course, pressurized the trunk, as well as filling it with lemon-scented shaving cream. Wow. When he popped open his trunk, it went POOF and a bunch of shaving cream came out. I wish I was there. Eventually he couldn't stand the lemon smell so he sold his car. Wimp.