Pop culture: Atlanta's World of Coca-Cola museum

John Pemberton, inventor of The Real Thing

They didn't side-step the New Coke debacle.

The Coke Store has lots of cool stuff like these salt and pepper shakers.

You can sample Coke products from around the world. These are from South America.

As far as beverages that taste like regurgitation go, Beverly is one of the best...

...and yet it still tastes better than Tab.

I don't care if it rots your teeth, has more sugar in one can than all of Cuba and gets you hopped up like a gerbil on a wheel, I love Coca-Cola. When I was a kid, those old Coke vending machines where you yanked out a frosty cold glass bottle and popped the top off with the built-in bottle opener were great. The first gulp always made you cry a little and would be followed by a satisfying "ahhhhhhhh" from your slightly burned throat. Atlanta is the hometown of Coke and they've got a really cool museum there called the World of Coca-Cola, right in the heart of downtown. There are historic exhibits, 3D movies, original Coke-inspired artwork, and a TV commercial viewing room. But the coolest room they have is called "Taste It." Coke makes many different flavored beverages that are sold in other parts of the world and here you get a chance to sample sixty of them, arranged geographically in five tasting stations. Some are fruity, some are earthy, some are God-awful. After sampling way, way too many flavors, my favorite was Inca Kola from Peru which offers a nice, fruity splash. Only the bravest pop aficionados should sample Beverly, however, an aperitif from Italy, which has a taste reminiscent of puke. There's also a great store with many fun, retro-designed Coke items. Yes, you do pay good money for the privilege of promoting a product that already permeates every corner of the earth, but why not? Coke adds life, it's the real thing, you can't beat the feeling, it's red, white and you, things go better, it's always Coca-Cola, and it's the pause that refreshes. Enjoy.

CNN-gaging: Atlanta's CNN Center

The CNN Center originally housed an indoor amusement park
called The World of Sid and Marty Krofft. No kidding.

They've got the world's tallest escalator.

They've got a CNN-terior decorator.

I can't picture Lou Dobbs wearing these.

We didn't see Anderson Cooper but they had a nice cardboard cutout of him.

We were lucky enough to visit the great city of Atlanta a few days before the terrible floods hit and our sympathies go out to the nice people in the area who have been suffering. A highlight of our stay was a visit to the CNN Center in the heart of downtown Atlanta. CNN's world headquarters are located here and the building houses its newsgathering departments as well as Turner Broadcasting's other network offices. In 1976, a developer asked Sid and Marty Krofft, creators of the television series H.R. Pufnstuf, to develop an amusement park for the new Omni International complex in downtown Atlanta. The World of Sid and Marty Krofft was the world's first indoor amusement park, but due to poor attendance it was closed after just six months. The Omni International building that contained the amusement park was renamed to the CNN Center when the site was converted to the present CNN headquarters. Seems like a rather incongruous transition to go from Witchiepoo to Wolf Blitzer, but there you go. They kept one unique feature: the world's tallest escalator. It stretches eight stories and descends into a giant globe. You can take a really great tour of CNN for $15, where you'll see the newsroom, its staff, and anchorpeople reading the news live off teleprompters. An amusing sign on the glass corridor overlooking the newsroom read "Please do not tap on the glass." They're journalists, not monkeys in a cage, you know. There's a CNN gift shop too, to remember all your friends by with swell souvenirs. The CNN Center gets our CNN-dorsement.