Best Water Ever

If you want a great example of how gullible the American consumer is, I have only two words for you: 
Bottled water.


I don’t know how they did it, but the bottled water people really pulled one over on us. Go to any grocery store, convenience store, and the stuff is flying off the shelves. They’ve caused our society to have a huge aversion to drinking the horrible, nasty water out of the tap.

How did the bottled water people pull that off? All of a sudden, many of us shun tap water as if it was from Mexico or Oklahoma.

We didn’t use to be like this. After all, how many of us grew up gulping water from a garden hose on a hot summer’s day?

And why don’t these bottled water drinkers have an aversion to ice? Do they think the ice in their soft drinks was made from Desani? Newsflash: It was made from tap water pushed through the mildewed tubes of an ice machine that hadn't been cleaned in a decade.

I remember my grade school in Texas. During recess, we had to remain out there on the hot, dusty playground until the bell rang. We’d be out there in 100-degree heat growing thirstier by the minute, just dying for a drink of water.

The moment the bell rang, a hoard of us would hurtle toward the outdoor water fountain which consisted of nothing more than a pipe with holes in it laying over a cement trough; a long, rusty flute with tepid water spurting out of it. A dozen of us sweaty kids would suck on it for dear life, like a dozen piglets on the teat of a sow.

Best. Water. Ever!

I remember working in my grandparent’s non air-conditioned dry cleaning establishment on hot Saturday afternoons. The place would be filled with steam from the presses and the humid air would be thick with the smell of dry-cleaning fluid. We had an ancient 1940s refrigerator in the back that held pitchers of water filled from the taps of the old, wooden rinse tubs in the back.

You’d be sweating all day from the steam and machinery, building up a mighty thirst. Upon hoisting one of those pitchers, you’d notice the thin film of ice that was always covering that wonderfully cold water from the old fridge.

Best. Water. Ever!

Yes, I keep a gallon of designer water in my fridge at home for drinking and for offering to guests. I refill it just about every day from the tap.

No, it’s not designer water from some glacier in Iceland – just good ‘ol dihydrogen monoxide from Lake Michigan.