Candy, beer and soda

Stuff

There is of course this Drudge alert, about the hidden mandatory add-on "health" charge added to restaurant bills in San Francisco (and spreading).  Today I noticed that 24 pack cubes of Coke and Pepsi product are now 20 pack cubes.  At the same price.  At least they abstained from blurbing  "New Easier to Lift"  on the packages.  Not unexpected in these times though.  Nothing is. The reality of the hidden price increase gambit  hit me as a youngster.  The Three Musketeer candy bar we bought for a nickel, that I remember as being the size if a truck driver's wallet, and scored to break into three regular sized bars, suddenly wasn't.  Big. We went  into the candy store after school one day,  and there it was, all small, but still costing a nickel.  We complained to the candy store guy, who was as far as we were concerned responsible.  He, the original "Soup Nazi," told us to get the hell out of his store if we weren't buying anything.  Never had a Three Musketeer again, because I didn't really like them.  Only bought them because I was brainwashed. What struck me about this Coke and Pepsi gambit, however, is  that both companies independently thought to do this at the same time.  How serendipitous.