I’ve been taking Airborne (at least, a Wal-Mart generic version of Airborne) this weekend, and it got me to thinking about Fizzies. When I was growing up, Fizzies were a special treat — a carbonated drink that worked like Alka-Seltzer, with little fizzy tablets that dissolved in a glass of water. It was probably the first artificially-sweetened drink I ever had, though I didn’t know it at the time. A sugar-sweetened version would have needed tablets the diameter of golf balls and wouldn’t have dissolved as easily.

In fact, it was the artificial sweetner — something called cyclamate — which caused the demise of the original Fizzies. It was taken off the market, and so were Fizzies.

About five years ago or so, some investors brought Fizzies back, in a new formula, as a mail order product. I ordered it, and it was a wonderful little bit of nostalgia. But the revival was short-lived, and the new company ceased production.

When I was drinking my fizzy Airborne-like supplement this weekend, I decided I would try the old Fizzies URL just for the heck of it. Sure enough, there’s been yet another revival. The manufacturers are selling only by the case, but there’s a store locator at the site. I also ran across a candy-nostalgia web site where you can order the new product. I don’t know if the people putting the product out now are the same ones who were putting it out five years ago — they ignore the revival five years ago and make it sound like this is the first time the product has been available since the Good Old Days.