water

I've never been an enthusiastic water-drinker.  When trying out dietary schemes in my long history of trying to reduce fat-weight, if they required the GALLON of water/day that has become the standard recommendation (which is, in turn, based on faulty reading of an actual scientific paper) -- the worst part of said diets wasn't the food but the damned WATER.

I can't drink ice-water.  I can SIP ice-water, but it'd take a LO-O-O-O-ONG time to down a gallon of it.  I can chug tepid water, but it's no fun -- and it makes my stomach feel as though there's a rock in it.  And unless one wants to do nothing the whole damn day but DRINK, one has to chug.

Fortunately, we've learned that the statement, "people need somewhere around 8 8-oz glasses of water per day" SHOULD have appended to it "but a good deal of that is contained in the foods we eat."  We've also learned that the truism, "by the time you're thirsty, you're already dehydrated" is drivel.  The only reasonable interpretation of the latter which might come close to truth is, "by the time you GET AROUND TO DRINKING WATER ..." because it's a human failing to not obey our bodies' calls for action when we first hear them, but when we're willing to take a break from what we're doing, and respond.

No, the cultural chorus of "drink water constantly" may be important where the climate is REALLY dry and hot, but to normal people who aren't flapping their jaws constantly (because that IS dehydrating), who aren't panting on the sidewalk or treadmill, who aren't literally singing for their supper ... it's just another unscientific meme.  My sister in Phoenix who smokes does well to carry her water bottle everywhere she goes.  I, in St. Louis (currently 81.5 F. and 58% humidity) ... not so much.

A couple of years ago while I was implementing "paleo" quite strictly in an effort to improve my health, I got myself a reverse-osmosis filter for our kitchen needs.  Here where they poison the entire populace with fluoride in the water, it may be the healthiest step a hypothyroid can take!  Chlorine in the water is bad enough but understandable -- it's a powerful decontaminant and it's easily filtered out --  hell, it even volatilizes off, if you let a vessel of tapwater stand in the refrigerator awhile before using it.  Not so, fluoride and a lot of the other toxic waste which is allowed to enter and remain in public water sources just because they don't reach some putative significant quantity.  Even though the dose makes the poison, I don't trust our regulatory agencies to either choose a tolerable dose for EVERYONE, OR to make sure that cap is never breached.

My RO filter serves the kitchen sink and the ice-maker in the fridge -- for any other household purpose we have to take pitchers-full to the site of use, for example the coffee-maker in the butler's pantry and the bathroom sink, upstairs (where we take our supplements).  Therefor, there's always a small pitcher of filtered water in the bathroom, which shows how much water can be drunk per day without even really noticing.  When J was working out-of-town, I refilled its approximate-quart-and-a-half capacity about every other day;  a swallow here and a swallow there adds up surprisingly fast.  When I do Strong Medicine strictly, and am required to drink three cups between breakfast and lunch, and again between lunch and dinner, a certain mark on that pitcher is my guide, and it sits beside me until it's empty;  at the time I put my burger on to cook, if it hasn't been drunk up, i'd chug the rest.  We hypo's NEED to make sure we don't dilute our stomach acid excessively at mealtimes!  I've learned that water-drinking at meals (OR iced tea, OR soft-drink) is a BIG mistake.  Hot coffee is acceptable, as is no more than 8 oz of wine.

Since we joined Costco and discovered it sells San Pellegrino at a good price, I've been using mineral water a lot more often.  Something about it just feels better than still water -- I suspect it's the lower pH.  The irritating qualities of sucralose-sweetened beverages aren't there, but the satisfaction IS.  I can sit down with a glass of it and feel as refreshed as if i'd had a glass of wine, but with significantly less nutritional baggage (carbs and alcohol). 

If only SP weren't owned by Nestle!!!  Meretricious outfit....  I need to find another brand that tastes as good but doesn't have THAT kind of baggage.  EDIT:  Evian is also carried by Costco, and doesn't seem to be owned by an outfit that claims that people don't have a RIGHT to safe sources of water....   :-P  Looks like i'll change to them when my current case of SP is empty!  When I did a side-by-side tasting of Evian and San Pellegrino, I liked the latter a little better -- but it was close.