Can't believe this thread went this long without:
At one time, Mountain Dew had the highest caffeine content of any any soda that was practical to buy in a lot of places. Jolt had more, but that was rarely available anywhere.
I remember my brother and I were forbidden from drinking either Mountain Dew or Mellow Yellow by our parents. When Jolt came out on the market, it was like smack for 13 year olds. (Dude, I picked up a pack of Jolt. I'm gonna drink it all right now!) Any other soda was ok, but not those.
I used to be a Pepsi guy until, I dunno, something about cola flavor just became unappealing. I switched to Dew and drank it pretty heavily for a few years until I started to get sick of it too (and started to get the Acid Reflux mentioned above. I'd have a Mountain Dew in the morning during class to perk up, and found it was especially bad then, because my stomach is always touchy for a few hours after waking up.)
Today I basically only drink it with a meal (I dunno, something about its sweetness cutting through the other flavors is like a palette cleanser for me. Yet I hate sweet "meal" foods. Go figure.) or the occasional one on the weekend. My soda consumption basically dropped by 75% when I started drinking (really strong) coffee as my drink of choice for doin' my own thing. I can't even conscious drinking a soda, any soda, in the morning now. I'd probably hurl.
Throwback
I don't really like the flavor of it, despite knowing that high fructose is something we should all be getting away from. That mouth-coating sweetness of high-fructose is part of the flavor of Dew to my brain. Kind of illuminated to me that drinking Dew isn't really about the flavor for me anymore, if it ever was. I think I originally switched to it from Cola because it was so mild in comparison. But orange isn't like a favorite flavor of mine, and after years of drinking Dew, if I'm honest, I'm starting to find the orange flavor a little sickening.
Maybe I've just become conditioned to it after so many years.
I think it's part conditioning, and part palette. People with a higher sensitivity to sweet flavors, as in they can detect mild sweetness in things most people would not, would probably find Dew completely overwhelming.
In the end I'm glad I switched to Coffee. I'm probably 20 pounds lighter than a lot of guys my age now because I quit so much soda period in my mid 20s, and Dew in particular.
This is why I'm glad I'm adverse to any sort of carbonated drink. For some reason, carbonated = bitter to the point of dry-heaving. Soda, beer- you name it, I can't drink it.
Bummer
There's some part of almost everyone's palette that's basically exclusionary. Even not liking the actual flavor of beer that much, I can still drink it to appreciate the flavor without dry heaving.