I have to just shake my head at some of the things we do in this nation and maybe also around the world. My continuing amazement is about water. How many of us 50 years ago would have ever envisioned paying inordinate amounts for water! Yes, you can go to Sam's Club or BJs, or Costco and buy bottled water for about 10 cents each for half liter bottles and due to the contamination of some of our rivers and streams it might seem the right thing to do to have clean water. What I'm mostly referring to is our obsession to invent more and more expensive ways to sell plain old H2O. We put a little fizz in the water and now it costs 75 cents rather than a dime. Then we add flavor in such small amounts it hardly tickles the taste buds and we add on another quarter. Import it from overseas and add 2.00 to the bottle! One company actually throws that in our face calling it's product Hint! Just think, it has such a small amount of flavoring added the company points this out in the name! Now we get into the imported waters from Finland, and Islands in the South Pacific -- Fiji Water. We have Smart water that is really smart because we are paying extra for it to be smart. About five years ago water overtook soda as the #1 consumer beverage. Back when I was 10 and taking a drink from a garden hose, how was I supposed to know that a whole gastronomic experience in water awaited me in the future. Last year I was at a garden that had a beverage kiosk. The sign read: Water, Soda, Tea, Coffee 7.50! Water has now been upgraded to the level of all other drinks, and even above. I'm not much of a drinker so I haven't kept up with beer prices but my guess is that for 3.50 (the cost of a bottle of VOSS), you could have a pretty nice beer!

I have to just shake my head at some of the things we do in this nation and maybe also around the world. My continuing amazement is about water. How many of us 50 years ago would have ever envisioned paying inordinate amounts for water! Yes, you can go to Sam's Club or BJs, or Costco and buy bottled water for about 10 cents each for half liter bottles and due to the contamination of some of our rivers and streams it might seem the right thing to do to have clean water. What I'm mostly referring to is our obsession to invent more and more expensive ways to sell plain old H2O. We put a little fizz in the water and now it costs 75 cents rather than a dime. Then we add flavor in such small amounts it hardly tickles the taste buds and we add on another quarter. Import it from overseas and add 2.00 to the bottle! One company actually throws that in our face calling it's product Hint! Just think, it has such a small amount of flavoring added the company points this out in the name! Now we get into the imported waters from Finland, and Islands in the South Pacific -- Fiji Water. We have Smart water that is really smart because we are paying extra for it to be smart. About five years ago water overtook soda as the #1 consumer beverage. Back when I was 10 and taking a drink from a garden hose, how was I supposed to know that a whole gastronomic experience in water awaited me in the future. Last year I was at a garden that had a beverage kiosk. The sign read: Water, Soda, Tea, Coffee 7.50! Water has now been upgraded to the level of all other drinks, and even above. I'm not much of a drinker so I haven't kept up with beer prices but my guess is that for 3.50 (the cost of a bottle of VOSS), you could have a pretty nice beer!