Fancy Pants
I’m sure the tap water in my house
is perfectly safe to drink. The city has a whole department dedicated
to making sure that the city water is clean and safe enough for human
consumption, it just doesn’t taste very good. My grandparents
would be mortified to know that I purchase water; they still think paper
towels are an extravagance. Why buy paper towels when you can
re-use a rag? My grandparents have a name for people who buy such
extravagances such as water and paper towels, they call them fancy pants.
So there I was the fancy pants grandson in the grocery store buying
water and I was astounded by the selection. When did water start
taking up an entire grocery aisle?
I remember as a kid the water section
was dwarfed by the soda aisle. There were a few gallons of water
and bottles of Perrier for the fancy pants of that era. Now there
is a whole section dedicated to water. Spring, purified, sparkling,
artesian, mineral, fruit flavored, vitamin infused, caffeinated and
even smart. Is that the problem, have I been drinking dumb water
all these years?
I felt very dumb. What did all
of these categories mean? Here is my research:
Spring Water: is defined as
bottled water derived from an underground formation from which water
flows naturally to the surface of the earth. To qualify as spring
water, it must be collected only at the spring or through a borehole
tapping the underground formation feeding the spring. If the collection
process uses some type of an external force, the water must be from
the same stratum as the spring and must retain the quality and all of
the same physical properties of water that flows naturally from a spring
to the surface.
Purified Water: This is a type of drinking water that has been treated with processes such as distillation, deionization or reverse osmosis. Basically, this just means that the bacteria and dissolved solids have been removed from the water by some process, making it "purified." Many bottled water brands are actually purified drinking water.
Mineral Water: Mineral water contains not less than 250 parts per million total dissolved solids and is defined by its constant level and relative proportions of mineral and trace elements at the point of emergence from the source. No minerals can be added to the water.
Sparkling Bottled Water: They
call this fizzy water in the UK. This type of water contains the same
amount of carbon dioxide that it had when it emerged from its source.
Artesian Water/Artesian Well Water:
Artesian water comes from a well that taps a confined aquifer-a
water-bearing underground layer of rock or sand-in which the water level
is above the top of the aquifer.
Vitamin Water: They might as well call it sugar water. Here is the label from a popular brand. Mind you they say there are 2.5 servings in each bottle, so that works out to 32.5 grams of sugar per bottle.
Nutrition Facts:
- Calories: 50
- Total fat: 0g
- Sodium: 0mg
- Potassium: 60mg
- Total carbohydrates: 13g
- Sugar: 13g
- Protein: 0g
- Vitamin C: 40%, Vitamin B3: 20%, Vitamin B6: 20%, Vitamin B12: 20%, Vitamin B5: 20%
- Potassium: 150mg per bottle
Ingredients: vapor distilled/deionized water, crystalline fructose, citric acid, vegetable juice (color), natural flavor, ascorbic acid (vitamin C), vitamin E acetate, magnesium lactate (elecrolyte), calcium lactate (electrolyte), zinc picolinate, monopotassium phosphate (electrolyte), niacin (B3), pantothenic acid (B5), pyridoxine hydrochloride (B6), cyanocobalamine (B12)
Caffeinated Water: Why not just have a cup of coffee?
Fruit Flavored Water: Aside from "natural flavor," most brands didn’t contain any actual fruit juice.
SmartWater: Is vapor distilled municipal water and an unspecified amount of the electrolytes calcium, magnesium, and potassium. Hello! This is tap water with some electrolytes and minerals thrown in.
All of these plastic water bottles made
me think about my carbon footprint in purchasing water, which lead me
to even further research. 1.5 million barrels of oil in the US
alone are used to make water bottles of which 86% are landfilled or
incinerated. The water also has to be shipped, which uses more fuel.
Maybe smartwater wasn’t so smart after all. Maybe my un-fancy
pants grandparents were right in drinking tap water and re-using rags.