DO DRINK THE WATER
By E.G. Brady

As all nutrition majors learn, it is vitally important that everyone drink at least eight (8, got it?) eight ounce glasses of water every day. Coffee, tea, soda pop, wine, beer and tequila do not count. In fact, for each one of the aforementioned toxic substances you imbibe, you must drink an extra glass of water (regulation 3.1415926535, USFDA-RDA enforcement bureau, whose new jurisdiction extends globally, including Mazatlán). So if you drink three cups of coffee for breakfast, a couple of beers for lunch, a half carafe of wine with dinner and a few too many margaritas before you pass out, you must drink an additional 18 glasses of water. If you smoke cigarettes or are in a tropical climate, such as Mazatlán, you double the amount. So 8 + 18 times 2 = 52 glasses of water per day, and that’s if you don’t smoke. The best way to do this is get together with friends and a deck of cards and play some of those old college drinking games, only the loser chugs a pitcher of water. Admittedly, this is one of those “do as I say, not as I do” type of lectures. If I drank the Mississippi dry, I’d probably still have some catching up to do. If you are here for just a week or two, the best approach is to every few hours buy a gallon jug of “agua purificada” (purified water) at the “soo-pear” (not quite a supermarket) down the block from you. If you’re here for a longer spell, arrange to have five-gallon carboys delivered to your abode. They only cost a couple of pesos more than a gallon and you get five times as much, after you pay a deposit on the carboy (garafon). If you are woken up early in the day by a small pick-up whose bed is full of giant clear blue water bottles, and the driver is honking away while bellowing “ aaa-guaaaa!!!! !!!!!!”, that’s the guy you want to talk to. If he has to haul it up stairs, you might consider tipping him enough so he will be inclined to come back again. If you figure out a way to pry the

plastic cap off the garafon without drawing blood, please let me know. My own hitherto secret weapon for winning the water war painlessly and effortlessly is about to be revealed. It is called a “michelada.” Basically, it is a glass full of ice, lime juice, salt, and maybe a dash of spice, with a nice cold beer to help the medicine go down. My father always said that any man who would put ice in his beer is a sissy, but he grew up in Alaska where you had to guzzle your beer fast or it would freeze. Here in tropical Mazatlán, it is perfectly acceptable to put ice in your beer so it stays cold and you stay hydrated, thus fulfilling your USFDA-RDA obligations without having to spend money on water, leaving more money for beer. Another way to improve your USFDA-RDA standing is to make very, very strong coffee and only drink one big cup. Instead of five or six margaritas, just have one big glass of straight tequila. Avoid the sun, tea, soda pop and cigarettes and you will only have to drink ten micheladas to come out even. Sounds a lot more appetizing than 52 glasses of water, eh what? They say the pirates of the Caribbean mostly never drank water for fear of germs, and subsisted entirely on solids, coconut milk, rum and nasty homebrewed ale. Admittedly, their life expectancy was so short, nutrition was not high on their priority list. Presumably, they had bigger things to worry about than the USFDA-RDA vitamin police. On the other extreme end of the H2O debate we find supermodels such as Kate Moss, Cheryl Tiegs and Twiggy who subsist entirely on brand-name bottled water, plus the occasional high-fibre rice cake with an alfalfa sprout as garnish. There has to be a happy medium. It is the responsibility of each adult individual to analyze carefully the above information, and choose a hydration program that suits his personal metabolic needs. Whatever floats your boat.

 

 

 

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