Little Need To Duck And Cover With New Juice Formula

So there I was strolling through Larry's, minding my own business over by the artichoke hearts, when I saw 'em: an entire battery of live Odwalla bottles - all aimed right at my midsection.

I did what any reasonable person would do - hit the floor and took cover behind the Tim's Cascade potato chips.

"Get down!" I screamed to the khaki-shorts crowd in the sushi line. "Juice in the hole!"

I hugged the tile and waited for the all-clear signal. It didn't come. Brian Lovejoy did, however. He introduced himself as the guy who develops juices for Odwalla. I introduced myself as the guy who, to this very moment, remains traumatized by an earlier near-death experience with an explosive Odwalla health drink.

During an ill-advised health-food kick 18 months ago - well before Odwalla's apple juice/e-coli bacteria problem - I recounted in this space the horrifying tale of a bottle of Odwalla "Superfood" exploding in my refrigerator, coating every inch of its innards in a nasty green slime with the look, feel and smell of banana-slug puree.

An Odwalla spokesperson later explained to me that Odwalla juices - raw, "live" products - were prone to explosive accidents if left unattended past their "enjoy by . . . " date.

Fine. So it was my fault. But I wondered whether there really should be a Federal Explosive Juice Products Safety Commission or some such to protect me from my nasty bachelor refrigerator-amnesia problems. To this day, I have nightmares in which I'm pursued through the vegetable drawer of my fridge by a giant, opaque-plastic monster spewing wheat germ, blue-green algae, seaweed and other yummy juice additives.

Time to confront my fear. I followed Lovejoy to a display case filled with Odwalla's new "Future Shake," a meal-replacement drink the smooth-talking Juiceman believes is destined to snake its way into the nutritional regimen of Busy Young Urban Professional Suckers such as myself.

This new stew, in its introductory "Vanilla Al'mondo" flavor, is oatmeal-colored and highly nutritional. It's billed as a meal-in-a-bottle - better than and more nutritious than other drink supplements with artificial ingredients, which Lovejoy calls "chemicals in a can."

I picked up a sample cup and passed it under my nose. "Smells good," I mustered, realizing after the words escaped that, in fact, it smelled exactly like a freshly washed dairy cow udder, which probably is good only if you're a farmer in Duvall.

With much trepidation, I sipped. Vanilla. Banana. A hint of almond. Not half bad. And it's pasteurized, to boot (NOT, Lovejoy notes, because it would be unsafe raw, but because slow cooking releases the drink's mango, almond, oat, vanilla and other flavors.)

"OK," I said. "Tastes fine. But I need to know the bottom line."

"Bottom line?"

"Yeah. How long until it erupts? It's T-minus what and counting? How wide's the blast zone?

Good news, Lovejoy assured. The new Odwalla can sit for almost twice as long as some of the old "live" Odwalla juices before it gets clearance for full-bottle throttle-up. "The other day I drank a bottle that was 31 days old," he proclaimed.

A brave act, but then he's a brave man: this Juiceman has been on the front lines selling Odwalla for many years. Once, he said, a bottle of "Passion Punch" - containing, among other things, pomegranate juice - exploded near his chest. He was unscathed, but everyone within a half-mile assumed he had been blasted by a shotgun, or worse.

Big deal, I said. I topped his little tale with one told to me by a checker at Costco, who described replacing an entire "popcorn-style" ceiling after an Odwalla carrot-juice bottle spewed its contents across it. I also recounted, in painstaking detail, the process of sandblasting my fridge interior after the aforementioned Super Food lit its own fuse.

"Hmm," said the Juiceman. "Well, spirulina isn't for everyone."

Truer words are rarely spoken - at least not in the Lower Queen Anne Larry's Market.

Another nearby Odwalla Juiceman then delivered the juice-blowup coup de grace, recounting several horrifying tales of live Odwalla drinks sliding under the individually adjustable bucket seats of expensive Lexii, where they remained for weeks, slowly simmering in the heat until . . .

See, you're way ahead of me.

In spite of all those brushes with juice terror, I continued to drink Odwalla - at least until I accidentally ingested some "Femme Vitale," a fortified drink designed for women. It didn't hurt me, although I did notice a marked decline in my channel-surfing urges for several weeks.

It took an all-new potentially explosive drink to get me to sidle back up to the Odwalla bar. Future Shake is available now in the Potent Juice/Coleman fuel section of your local grocer, where it sells for a mere $2.99 a pint. Soon, a new caffeinated flavor - mocha motion - will be released. Two things you can say about these Odwalla folks. They have a sense of humor. And they learn fast.

You'll notice the new drinks, unlike the old Odwalla explosive juices, are sort of a bland, taupe color. It's oddly similar in tone to the industrial pile carpeting and ceiling material found in most suburban homes across America.

"Coincidence," Lovejoy says.

Pure, natural coincidence.