As someone who has formed several unique and cherished friendships with some of Canada’s loveliest representatives, it saddens me today to have to tell you all that not all that comes from the Great White North is wonderful. I offer as my only exhibit (and perhaps the only exhibit I will need): Orbitz.

Long before it became synonymous with online travel planning, Orbitz was a truly heinous “texturally enhanced” drink idea introduced to North America by Vancouver’s Clearly Canadian beverage company. What does “texturally enhanced” mean? It means that there were chewy little bits of flavor-freaky gel balls suspended in clear liquid that was only a shade or two less syrupy than drinking Karo syrup.

Yes, I do believe that Orbitz was the only drink in history with balls. You’d have to have balls to put this out as a serious idea. And, yes, the bottles pictured are from my very own collection. Sadly, I am such a hoarder that I saved unopened bottles of this stuff. I made a special trip, in fact, to buy these bottles after drinking half a bottle of the vanilla orange flavor (seen on the far left of this photo). Why? Because A) I knew immediately that this drink was not going to make it beyond a hopefully very-short-lived novelty period; and B) I doubted it would ever make it up to the D.C. area. These were purchased in the great taste-testing hot bed of North Carolina. And, no, I never did see them in my neck of the woods.

And for the record, not only did I endure a half bottle of the liquid, I also consumed quite a few of the gel spheres. Yes, I swallowed. I even chewed, which turned out to be a not so great idea. The spheres had the taste and consistency of chewing on a vitamin C-flavored phlegm ball. I will say this though: Orbitz was one of the first products that I can remember tapping into the marketing potential of the Internet. Check the silver lids: They’re imprinted with the drink’s Web site, the now usurped www.orbitz.com.

True, this isn’t that far of a flashback today: I found Orbitz in July of 1997, not long after it was introduced to the American market. I never saw it again after that crazy, syrupy summer. But I’m proud to say that I have tangible evidence that even Canadians make bad decisions every now and again. We could learn a lesson from them, however, in how to let go of a bad idea before it gets out of hand. Too bad “W” wasn’t a Canadian product…