I just had a strange realization. George Harrison has always been my favorite Beatle. I became aware of this this morning as I was making my breakfast and listening to Pandora.com. Pandora is a web site wherein you input your favorite bands, or even just songs, and it tailors a playlist of music based on your inputs. I have two 'stations' set up there. One is populated by my more energetic likings, and one is just for mellow stuff. I tend to use the mellow one in the mornings, and today a George Harrison tune played and struck my brain at just such an angle as to cause the titular awareness. I was not so much amazed by my liking of the late Beatle, but more by the realization that I had not been consciously aware of that particular predilection. It seems similar to my ability to suddenly notice a tree in the yard next door and be absolutely sure it wasn't there before, only to be informed that it had been there for centuries. Am I alone in having such mental blind spots?
This just in from the 'no shit, Sherlock' desk. The Environmental Protection Agency announced that bottled water is no cleaner than municipal tap water. In fact city water is actually better regulated since they are required to test the water quality daily, whereas bottled water companies do so far less often. The major difference is that most bottled water(more than half of which is tap water anyway) has been filtered to remove the chlorine and fluoride. We use a water filtering pitcher at home which does the same thing for far less money. Personally I think that the massive popularity of bottled water is a huge comment on the mindless consumerism that has infected the industrialized world. In my life I may have purchased a dozen bottles of water, and almost all of those times were when I needed portability. And I almost always refill the bottle several times from a fountain or the tap at home. But some people buy hundreds of bottles of the stuff a year, convinced that since it's in a bottle it must be safer than the water from the faucet. Yet even the water bottlers won't say that their product is better for you. They can't. It's the same damned water! I would love to shake the hand of the person who first realized that people are such sheep that you could sell them something that is freely available. I wonder if we could get Nomads in the Sahara to buy bottled sand? Might be worth a try.
Oh, one other thing. For some reason I haven't been getting my email notification of your comments, so if I take a while to respond pray forgive me.
Thirstily yours,
Marius
1 comment:
Water bottles. I see good & bad. I hate the waste of plastic & water. At the Crest we see many bottles thrown away with only a few sips being consumed (mostly because of lack of identification, "was this my bottle or yours?"). On the other hand as a water drinker (& yes Marius, I usually carry my own bottle filled from the tap) I can remember a time when water was not a choice unless you were at home or in an actual restaurant. At big industrial gigs the only choice offered were various canned beverages. And forget about getting water at a convenience store. Now at least there is a healthy alternatives. Also if you travel around to different regions a lot, bottled water can certainly help maintain your gastric integrity. Any one who has never felt the havoc "different" water can cause in your body should feel blessed.
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