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Cherry Pharm Alarm

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Adventures in Snacking

When I first saw Cherry Pharm juice in the Statler, I knew it was only a matter of time before I plunked down $2.50 to try it. Sure the bottle is about one fifth the size of a regular juice, and of course that’s a waste of money, but something about that sexy little bottle full of red juice was driving me out of my mind with desire. (I’m a sucker for red-heads.) Don’t pretend you haven’t been tempted. The creators put fliers by the cash register, and the juice even gets its own little wooden house next to the soda. Basically, this juice arrived on the scene with the full force of a marketing tornado, and I didn’t have time to get into my cellar before it swept me up in a drinking frenzy.

Slow down Charlie, slow down. Maybe the readers don’t know what Cherry Pharm Juice is. Okay, sorry. Cherry Pharm is a “Whole Tart Cherry” juice that contains over 50 cherries not from concentrate. Why do they spell farm with a PH? To invoke the image of a pharmacy of course!Cherry Pharm “harnesses the natural power of cherries” and features “powerful anti-oxidants” The bottle also informs me that the cherry juice was produced to retain maximum phyto-nutrients. According to their slogan you truly have to “feel it to believe it.” The cherries are proven as natural pain relievers, anti-inflammatories and sleep regulators. It’s even the official cherry juice of the New York Rangers! (Pop quiz: name three current New York Rangers. I didn’t think so.)

Now my lifestyle consists of working, eating junk food, and laying about. Notice what I left out there? Correct, I never exercise. Ever. I belong to a gym so I can go to the sauna. Because I never exercise, but want to live forever, I am always on the lookout for pseudo-scientific things that will make me “healthier.” My full concept of health and the human body comes from pharmaceutical advertisements. (e.g. I know there is such a thing as good cholesterol and bad cholesterol, I know that I do not suffer from restless leg syndrome, and I know that when the time comes, I’m going to be a Levitra man.) I may not know much (anything) about nutrition, but I do know that oxidants are bad, and anti-oxidants are good. I’m not sure what phyto-nutrients are, but I know I’m not getting enough of them. So with all this in mind, I shook up my bottle of Cherry Pharm, and attempted to swig the whole thing down in one gulp.

Because the cherries were so tart, there was no way I was going to finish in one big swig, but I still thought to myself, “Cherry Pharm tastes good!” That’s really the first thing I thought. It basically tastes like eating a whole can of cherry pie filling, but without the risk of immediately getting diabetes. I have definitely eaten at least 25 whole cherries in one sitting, so I figured drinking the rest of Cherry Pharm wouldn’t be so bad. After the first swig, I checked the nutrition facts. I guess there is no daily recommended serving of phyto-nutrients, but at least I was getting 4 percent of my iron. I started on the second gulp.

Just as I was taking a second sip, the pharm from my first hit my stomach. The feeling was not unlike the curdling feeling you get when taking a “cement mixer shot” (add lime juice to Bailey’s.) It felt like all 50 cherries were leading a full-fledged war against the rest of my body. I remembered at this moment the sediment that had formed on the bottom of the bottle. Just how hardcore were these tart cherries? And how tough must the New York Rangers be to drink this stuff all the time? “So, how exactly did your body react,” you ask? I’ll try to keep this polite. For starters I broke into a cold sweat, and as my stomach churned I realized I needed to get home … fast.

This was not the first time a snack had turned against me. Once I got overzealous with hot sauce on my chili, and found myself in a real predicament. I tried to use every old wives’ tale about spicy food at once, and ended up outside, topless in the winter, with peanut butter smeared all over my mouth. I chugged milk and shoved white bread into the corners of my cheeks, all the while rubbing my tongue with an absorbent paper towel. (None of these methods worked; I may or may not have been crying because of how spicy this sauce was.)

But why did my stomach, which I might as well call ole’ iron sides, get so soundly trounced by a handful of delicious cherries? (Warning: Charlie Niesenbaum has no scientific training and is not a scientist.) I have a scientific hypothesis: Because all I eat is junk food, which I imagine is made up entirely of oxidants; my body must be entirely made up of oxidants. Therefore when I drink a powerful concentration of anti-oxidants, my body literally begins to fall apart. In an effort to protect me from certain doom, my stomach, generally my most loyal organ, acted against my short term interest and rejected Cherry Pharm 100% All-Natural Juice. In short, Cherry Pharm juice made me throw up. (Three out of Five Stars)

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