Is it safe for me to drink sugar water?

[nevermore]

I grew up in California where it's usually called "soda," but I generally used (and still do use, when I don't think about it), a Southernism that I picked up from my mother, in which "coke" means "any carbonated soft drink, including Coca-Cola." In my family, a perfectly common and comprehensible conversation might be something like this:
"Would you like a coke?"
"Yes, thanks. Do you have any Seven-Up?"

Yeah, or while ordering, you say "I'll have a coke" and the server asks "What flavor" or "What kind". I picked that up when I was in college down South. I generally say "soda", but will occassionally lapse.

 

[The Boy Who Cried Worf]

I grew up in California where it's usually called "soda," but I generally used (and still do use, when I don't think about it), a Southernism that I picked up from my mother, in which "coke" means "any carbonated soft drink, including Coca-Cola." In my family, a perfectly common and comprehensible conversation might be something like this:
"Would you like a coke?"
"Yes, thanks. Do you have any Seven-Up?"

Yeah, or while ordering, you say "I'll have a coke" and the server asks "What flavor" or "What kind". I picked that up when I was in college down South. I generally say "soda", but will occassionally lapse.

In California if you ask for a Coke it's always either "sure" or "is Pepsi ok"? If a waiter asked me what flavor I'd think he meant they have Cherry, Lemon, and Vanilla.

 

[Trekker4747]

I think "coke" is mostly a generic term for that "flavor" of soda/pop/cola which would include only Coke and Pepsi in restaurants (unless your restaurant is one of the scant few that offers R.C. or some generic "cola"). Or as a "generic term" for the entire catagory of fizzy beverages but only in very rare circumstances. Can't say I've ever heard someone refer to, say, Dr Pepper as a "coke."

If I'm in a restaurant and I order a fizzy beverage I'll usually say, "I'll have a Coke, Pepsi, whichever one you carry."

But more often than not I order iced tea.