NBC Nightly News is covering risk of stroke or dementia tripling from

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

35. I keep on being stunned at the large amounts

of soft drinks, whether diet or sugar, that most people consume. In the grocery store, it seems as though hardly a cart goes by that doesn't have at least one, and more often several of those massive 24-can (or however many they are) boxes of soft drinks. Why?

Some years back I stopped bringing soft drinks into my home, because my younger son would simply drink too much of them. I still routinely drank soft drinks when eating out. The sugared ones, as I'd given up the diet ones years before as I realized how terrible the chemicals in them were.

Over time, I drank fewer and fewer soft drinks, and now it's less than one in a month. On a long-distance drive I'm likely to get a Seven-Up or its equivalent when getting gas, but that's about it any more.

And I can't imagine what full-fat drinks are out there. Full sugar, maybe, but I'd say there's pretty much zero fat in any of the soft drinks.