There are countless things you can do to stop the epidemic of childhood obesity in your own home, but feeding them a snack of carbonated fruit isn't one of them.

Wal-Mart, that unholy bastion of inferior organic food standards, and 7-Eleven stores across the Southern United States are now selling Fizzy Fruit, a not-cheap fruit cup filled with whole grapes or slices of pineapple or apples exposed to the very same carbon dioxide that makes useless and unnatural sugary sweet soft drinks pop.

An interesting factoid: Just to complete the connection between soft drinks and Fizzy Fruit, the company's current president and marketing chief are both former Coca-Cola executives. So, that may explain why Fizzy Fruit has infiltrated the marketplace so quickly and, perhaps, captured your child's attention with all the kid-friendly imagery on their Web site.

Like other critics, I'm appalled, but not surprised, food manufacturers are stooping so low as to offer fruit in such an unnatural state. That said, if Cadbury Schwepps can get away with calling 7-Up "100 percent natural," no matter how unnatural it really is, anything is possible...