Defend the indefensible: Buying bottled water

If you're buying fast food, it's better for you than juice or soft drink

if you're out (in the city e.g., or sightseeing or something), sometimes it just isnt feasible to find a tap. drinking in a toilet sink is gross. plus it is good to have a drink that isn't bad for you and is cool, and you can take it places while you drink it.

that's all i got

I can't defend it, and wont buy it unless theres some reason of extreme need (I desperately need water and there is no other source). I drink tap water. I keep a bottle and I refil it.

The stuff about the Fiji water makes me furious, knowing how poor a country Fiji is.

I like Fast Company, but haven't bought it in a while. Good article! Thanks.

I personally have a water bottle at my desk at work that I bought upstairs at the overpriced cafe next to the gym. I think it was full of Ice Mountain brand water when I bought it, but I have refilled it countless times from the tap or the water cooler (I know... that's still bottled water). It holds 20 fluid ounces (about 600ml), and I go through six or seven bottles a day. I like the bottle, it has a little flip top. Every 6-8 weeks, I'll trash it and go buy another bottle, and keep filling in the same way. I don't feel too bad. I really am buying just the bottle.

what about starbucks' ethos water, which claims to put some profits back into getting clean water to people who need it, even if it doesn't address the environmental costs.

At the Peninsula hotel in Beverly Hills, where the rooms start at $500 a night and the guest next door might well be an Oscar winner, the minibar in all 196 rooms contains six bottles of Fiji Water. Before Fiji Water displaced Evian, Diet Coke was the number-one-selling minibar item. Now, says Christian Boyens, the Peninsula's elegant director of food and beverage, "the 1 liter of Fiji Water is number one. Diet Coke is number two. And the 500-milliliter bottle of Fiji is number three."

Heh. Attention Diet Coke addicts: you're also kinda douchey.

I remember when I was a kid I got together with a friend and filled up milk cartons full of water and tried selling it door to door. One lady was nice enough to give us a break, take us seriously and buy it. Later after some adult or other explained the pointlessness of this to me, and I felt silly. Man, how times change...

I can't defend it either, on two main grounds: 1)That's really wasteful to have all that plastic in landfills and 2) I bet the chemicals in the plastic end up seeping into the water and cause you harm. From what I have read, these chemicals mimic estrogen in your body and end up in the food chain. I'm way too tired right now to go into it any further, though. See you guys later.

I like the last lines of the article a lot:

Once you understand the resources mustered to deliver the bottle of water, it's reasonable to ask as you reach for the next bottle, not just "Does the value to me equal the 99 cents I'm about to spend?" but "Does the value equal the impact I'm about to leave behind?"

Simply asking the question takes the carelessness out of the transaction. And once you understand where the water comes from, and how it got here, it's hard to look at that bottle in the same way again.

In other words, river wolf OTM on that thread where he was being... what was it?... prickly?... about taking responsibility for eating meat.

It was a good laugh being in New York City at the height of the Vitamin Water craze!

Its also hilarious that the 2 top selling waters in the US arent even mineral water! Theyre freaking tap water!

Kenan I do what you do: I buy a 1.5L bottle for the bottle, and refil it from our filtered tap at work. At home, I just drink from the tap.

This has been a contentious issus here, because we've suffered from drought for a long time now and Melbourne is currently on pretty strict water restrictions (and will be on worse ones this summer I imagine).

Despite this, CocaCola Amatil got permission from a local council just out of melbourne to tap into their water supply - the only one the locals have as their wwater supply - to bottle and resell it back to everyone.

And they pay something obscene like 5 cents a lake's worth. Its obscene.

SO obscene I had to say so twice. I'm having a bad day.

Tap water in Basel tastes bad and may be dangerous (according to Greenpeace). There are no suck excuses elsewhere in Switzerland, though.

A chilled plastic bottle of water in the convenience-store cooler is the perfect symbol of this moment in American commerce and culture. It acknowledges our demand for instant gratification, our vanity, our token concern for health.

also, thirst. seriously though, "instant gratification", what the fuck.

did you miss the part where water is readily available and perfectly sanitary everywhere? Did you read the article?

in today's culture even eating is so crass compared to noble African hunger

in my local coffee shop -- in fact, in EVERY urban local coffee shop, and likely a lot of other places -- there's a big bucket of water, local tap water, full of local ice, with cups next to it. Drink all you want, it's water. Within a few feet there's also a big cooler that holds fruit juice, energy drinks, iced coffee, and bottled water. This article is saying that water, just plain water -- safe, clean, and plentiful, like they always said about nuclear energy -- is being ignored because people are buying the same product, only packaged and marketed. AND THAT'S WEIRD.

actually, the article doesn't even get into how it's weird, it's focused on how it's ridiculously wasteful.

That is weird, and wasteful. I would always take the free water where it was available.

A group of us were in a restaurant in Amsterdam the other night and one of us asked for tap water to drink. He was told that the restauarant only sold bottled water. I wonder if this is legal in a food establishment. Shouldn't it be the law that you have to give people free water if they ask for it? I know this was an issue years ago when nightclubs were losing money on the bar because kids were taking ecstasy and just filling water bottles in the toilet sinks, so some nightclubs stopped the water in the sinks in order to sell more bottled water. I seem to remember an action being successfully taken against them because of this.

Accentmonkey:

In fact, says Ingrid Gubbay, campaigns lawyer at consumer group Which?, restaurants do not legally have to provide free tap water. Only licensed clubs do, a hangover from the old highways and inn laws that said tap water had to be given out for free to thirsty travellers. In a restaurant however when you order a meal you're agreeing to pay for the food and drink and service and this is a contract for work and materials to which the Supply of Goods and Services Act applies. "While a restaurant can't force you to buy mineral water, it can legitimately charge you for providing tap water as mean as it might sound. The provision of any water includes an element of service, such as pouring water into a jug and cleaning it after you," says Gubbay.

That's from here: http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/ellie_levenson/2006/11/water_water_everywhere.html

in england they have to give you tapwater in a restaurant.

but to give an idea of when i buy bottled water: i travel from my home by train to another city, and among the places where there isn't free drinking water are: the train, the centre of london, and the train again. so during the 12 hours or however long i'm there, i will drink tap water from a bottle which at one point had mineral water in it. i replace the bottle every few weeks i guess.

i don't know anyone who buys a bottle of mineral water, tosses it, and just buys another. everyone refills. perhaps rich folk do this, i don't know.

oh xpost. that's interesting. i have never been refused tapwater in a restaurant.

nightclubs were losing money on the bar because kids were taking ecstasy and just filling water bottles in the toilet sinks, so some nightclubs stopped the water in the sinks in order to sell more bottled water

Fantastic! Who doesn't like dehydrated kids? Or better yet, dead ones?!

That makes me feel better, it's not just us. People are assholes all over. :(

I know. I heard that in some clubs they even boxed in the toilet cisterns, but I suspect that this had more to do with people leaving DROGZ in them than drinking out of them.

i don't know anyone who buys a bottle of mineral water, tosses it, and just buys another. everyone refills. perhaps rich folk do this, i don't know.

My cousin lives in an apartment close to a Lidl supermarket and a kids' playground and says that during the summer the teenagers would go into Lidl, buy bottles of mineral water, have water fights with the water, and then throw the bottles in the river. She did shout at them for doing it, but they just looked at her like she was a bit touched.

NickB, thanks for info.

Plastic bottles in rivers are ubiquitous in Sydney. Plastic wastage issues aside, I do wonder if the end result of all this tap water marketing involves some kind of master plan to privatise water supply in general and, in the end, make water really expensive instead of almost free. Perhaps that's a little paranoid, I don't know.

The water supply is privatised in the UK at least. If the water companies could demonstrate to the government regulator that water prices had to go up to meet increasing production costs (e.g. due to severe water shortages), then there's no reason why tap water couldn't become a much more expensive commodity. They would of course also have to defend high leak rates and record profits and the like first though.

the russian drinks bottled water and throws the bottles away. it is part of her princess-and-pea thing and drives me nuts. totally fucking indefensible. not to mention GULLIBLE.

"more money than sense" as we say in the 1950s.

does the water you use to wash dishes and yourself and so on have to be as clean as the water you use to drink?

The water you use to wash dishes should be. The water you wash yourself with, not necessarily, as long as you don't get any of it in your mouth or eyes.

no. most places in the uk water-you-use-to-wash-yourself is not as clean as drinking water.

crosspost

idea that bottled water is somehow going to be cleaner than tapwater is blind faith anyway right.

we're flushing our toilets w/ drinking water

you personally or generally in the uk? i'm not sure that's true of everyone. someone explained to me the difference once... errrrrr though thinking about it maybe the difference was 'imposed' on the water (ie mains water vs drinking water) after it had entered the house, which sort of makes my point moot...

I really just don't like water, regardless of bottle. I have to force myself to drink it everyday.

xpost yeah, kitchen/drinking tap water comes from the running main, bathroom water usually comes from a water tank which is supplied by the running main - so same water initially - but might be full of limescale, pondscum, dead pigeons, ebola.

oh well.

they don't have a special drinking pipe and a normal pipe just the main. unless you have something special rigged up all the water in taps, showers and toilets is the same and treated the same

crosspost

should be flushing w/ rain water or water from your dishes or bath or washing machine or whatever

yes. but when they designed the water supply system, they probably didn't envisage that need.

mind you the water from dishes can be pretty fucked up.

As the cost of supplying drinking water goes up, and we all start getting metered, I'm sure that 'grey water' recycling systems will become a lot more common.

didn't envisage what would eventually be seen as wasteful

changing the water that flushes toilets doesn't have to do w/ the water supply system just means stopping used water from leaving the house immediately and reusing it

crosspost

I think that they can now fit filters too, just so that you don't get random carrot chunks popping up in yr karzy.

the russian drinks bottled water and throws the bottles away. it is part of her princess-and-pea thing and drives me nuts. totally fucking indefensible. not to mention GULLIBLE.

-- emsk, Thursday, 27 September 2007 10:09

i don't know why i'm allowing this to surprise me, but...well.

changing the water that flushes toilets doesn't have to do w/ the water supply system just means stopping used water from leaving the house immediately and reusing it

it does have to do with the water supply system as a whole: the set-up we have wasn't the free choice of each householder to organize things as they chose with the water that was distributed to them. matter of volume building and so on. and changing it meaningfully would also be a volume thing. leaving it to individuals won't do much.

conserving water by not leaking a shitload of it seems to me a more pressing priority?

Cold water is cold water in the UK domestic system, unless you know your house does something clever with re-use or rain collection. It's all clean enough to drink. It can get a bit scuzzy in the boiler though, so it's a bad idea to drink or cook with hot water from the tap/shower.

> conserving water by not leaking a shitload of it seems to me a more pressing priority?

they have been replacing the victorian mains in west london for the past year or so, possibly more. seem to be using 12" diameter plastic tubing. was surprised at how small it was.

it does have to do with the water supply system as a whole: the set-up we have wasn't the free choice of each householder to organize things as they chose with the water that was distributed to them. matter of volume building and so on. and changing it meaningfully would also be a volume thing. leaving it to individuals won't do much.

The water companies' responsibility ends at your front door. There could be two different supplies I guess, both treated to different standards but the costs would be huge, so it makes more sense to convert yer plumbing, and like I said, that's not the Thames Water's problem.

seem to be using 12" diameter plastic tubing. was surprised at how small it was.

The supply pipes have to be of a certain size to maintain water pressure I think.

The water companies' responsibility ends at your front door. There could be two different supplies I guess, both treated to different standards but the costs would be huge, so it makes more sense to convert yer plumbing, and like I said, that's not the Thames Water's problem.

-- NickB, Thursday, September 27, 2007 12:59 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

what i was talking about was: municipal water supply (as was) + municipal housebuilding (as was) amounts to a large system the (original) occupants of which had no role in designing. compulsion of present occupants to redress this at their own cost seems illiberal. i wasn't arguing for a dual-pipe system or anything, but the cost of re-plumbing every house in britain should surely be shared rather than put on individual householders? either way it's a massive subsidy to the pipe-rejiggers so why not do it formally?

Well, if you're going to be charged for water, or your water use is going to be capped, then it's up to you to decide how you deal with that, I suppose.

However, government subsidies and so on should certainly apply, and developers should not be given planning permission for developments that lack grey water facilities as well as other resource conservation measures.

privatization was a dick move.

It can get a bit scuzzy in the boiler though, so it's a bad idea to drink or cook with hot water from the tap/shower.

I asked my plumber about this, and he said the reason people of our generation were told not to drink from the hot water tap is that lead was once used in the soldering/welding process for hot pipes but wasn't needed for cold pipes.

Cold water is cold water in the UK domestic system

yes if you have a direct water supply, no if it's indirect, as i said upthread: bathroom water comes via a tank and might be icky.

i don't know what proportion of households have what system but suspect that direct supply is a more modern development.

fiji water is really the most delicious though

privatization was a dick move.

Basically yes. Water companies make more money the more water they can sell. At the same time, they're compelled by legislation to encourage people to conserve water. You do wonder just how hard they're going to try to get the conservation message across. Drought conditions do change this though, cos hosepipe bans etc are not so good for business.

fiji water is really the most delicious though

Is that sarcasm or does this mystical juice really have a distinctive taste? I can't really tell any of the still waters I've had apart from each other.

http://www.fofiji.org/index_files/Fiji_water_1.jpg

I won't defend bottled water, but I will point out that claiming "I don't drink bottled water for environmental reasons" is sort of like saying "I don't drive an SUV for environmental reasons." I mean good for you, and you're doing more than a lot of people, but the environmental impact is probably small compared to a lot of the things you still do and take for granted.

that's v clever of you you dick

I know it's a dick thing to say - I wouldn't even bother except in the context of trying to "defend the indefensible."

Isn't it fucked up how americans ride big diesel-burning ships out to caribbean islands, knowing how poor the people are there

next up on fastcompany.com, we indict the entire tourism industry, because it's a lot like humvees

and I'm not saying that the argument doesn't have merit, but the article itself is coming from a really disingenuous shit bin and also it's 2007 guys way to turn back the clock

Water companies make more money the more water they can sell. At the same time, they're compelled by legislation to encourage people to conserve water. You do wonder just how hard they're going to try to get the conservation message across. Drought conditions do change this though, cos hosepipe bans etc are not so good for business.

-- NickB, Thursday, September 27, 2007 1:43 PM (38 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

i would have thought that drought/shortage is excellent for business. i suppose it depends how far their pricing structure is imposed by the government, but if they are truly privatized, lack of water will push the price up even as use has to decline too. monopoly + deregulation = $$$

monopoly + deregulation = $$$

oh yes that's quite a nuanced understanding

be more nuanced in five words.

Like everyone else, I buy bottled water once in awhile, refill the bottle, and carry it around with me daily. Usually I have to get a new one every week or few weeks because I either lose it (which is why I don't carry around a Nalgene, they're expensive as well as bulky and I have lost several) or someone I live with thinks, "Oh, an empty plastic bottle, why don't I be helpful and throw that in the trash." It definitely is a waste to buy regularly for the sake of the water itself, esp. as I'm kind of irritated that they sell it like it's something special but most of the brands I see sold are just tap water, what the fuck? (xpost)

i would have thought that drought/shortage is excellent for business

When water's short you have to start exploiting more expensive sources, but you won't be able to pass these costs on to the customer because, yes, the pricing structure is set with the regulator.

I rarely by bottled water. Becuase I don't like the idea of all the plastic waste and because of the phthalates in plastic bottles, I have one of these that I fill with tap water and carry with me pretty much everywhere:

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c287/expatrica/sigg.jpg

because of the phthalates in plastic bottles

Try saying that after a few beers

It can get a bit scuzzy in the boiler though, so it's a bad idea to drink or cook with hot water from the tap/shower.

where does your hot tap water come from?

i buy bottled water, specifically poland spring, because it tastes like the tap water in maine where i grew up, and all other tap water tastes like crap in comparison. i drink like 2 litres a day of it.

Water filter jugs work quite well to get the taint out of water. Not a big fan of the taste of taint me, if you'll pardon the expression.

I don't drink bottled water cuz it's expensive and tastes like shit. getting to feel smugly superior to everyone who does is just an added bonus.

because of the phthalates in plastic bottles

explain me this please. i know bottles of boots brecon carraeg or whatever have warnings not to reuse them, but i thought that was just code for PLEASE TO BUY MORE OF OUR STUFF KTHXBYE.

That's a pretty bottle, ENBB. I bought nalgenes for Nick & I, and even though I don't remember to bring it with me ever day, it's definitely saved us money. We'll be out and about walking around and instead of buying a cold beverage, water or otherwise, we can just drink our own tap water. We get free bottled waters at work, but I realized I was running through 3 of those a day which is really wasteful. At the very least, I try to refill mine now.

I was disturbed a little the other day when I passed a poor looking woman leaving the grocery store with two 24 packs of bottled water in her cart. Should that really be a priority??

explain me this please. i know bottles of boots brecon carraeg or whatever have warnings not to reuse them, but i thought that was just code for PLEASE TO BUY MORE OF OUR STUFF KTHXBYE.

The whole phthalates thing is pretty unclear and controversial. The plastics industry claims that plastics used for food packaging do not contain phthalates (chemical compounds that are used in plastics and have been linked to reproductive problems in animals) and that other chemicals are monitored closely to see how much they actually leach out into the product. So, it's probably fine but I'd rather be safe then sorry.

KC - Thanks! I love it. Sigg has so many awesome designs that it was hard to choose one.

"Oh, an empty plastic bottle, why don't I be helpful and throw that in the trash."

This used to happen to me in work, when I had a plastic bottle that I refilled from the filtered tap. So I wrote my name on it and wrote DO NOT THROW OUT THIS BOTTLE PLEASE on it and the cleaners stopped throwing out my bottle and that's the end of my story about my bottle.

explain me this please. i know bottles of boots brecon carraeg or whatever have warnings not to reuse them, but i thought that was just code for PLEASE TO BUY MORE OF OUR STUFF KTHXBYE.

Not sure that reuse would necessarily cause a greater amount of plasticizers like phthalates to leach into the water than normal unless you let the bottle get really old so that the plastics start breaking down. I think the blurb might be more of an argument that reusing the bottle without washing it out properly could lead to bacteria building up in it.

so want to try this!

http://www.trippon.com/images/BlingWater_1.jpg

I buy big jugs of water for the fridge at home, because the tap water here tastes like ass. Sorry.

I have a nalgene I pretty much take around.

The bar I work at was a coffee shop in the daytime and the most amazing amount of people would come in and ask for some tap water- TO GO. It was so many people that we had to start charging them $0.25. And some people got so upset that we were charging them for tap water. I thought it was pretty tacky for people to come in, not buy anything and just want tap water in a to go cup when there are 10 bodegas on the same street. They thought we were being cheap. We stopped carrying bottle water awhile ago. People who come in bringing their own nalgene or thermos and wanted coffee to go, I would charge them lee.

lee=less obv.

if they are taking a to-go cup that costs your store money! also, you are putting the water in the cup for them, do they assume you work for free? they sound like jerks.

Reusing a plastic water bottle over more than a day isn't especially healthy, I don't believe. I don't carry around any of my several nalgenes for the same reason I don't wear hiking boots or a backpack to the offices, though I suppose I could use them more on weekends.

Defend the indefensible: Buying bottled carbonated hfcs. Oh wait I don't do that.

Who cares if there is a nalgene at your desk instead of a bottled water though?

I've been trying these water bottles made out of corn (PLA). They decompose in 90 days in a landfill/compost system, and come with an activated carbon filter that's good for 90 uses. The filter is kind of annoying, honestly. Water from the tap in Seattle tastes good, as opposed to tap water in Phoenix, which is full of chlorine and various other things due to being transported in open canals where the evaporation rate is 7'/year.

I haven't checked into the backstory on PLA yet; I'm sure it's incredibly inefficient w/r/t water/energy/resources.

I have my bike bottles on my desk, wtf is wrong with that?

I don't carry around any of my several nalgenes for the same reason I don't wear hiking boots or a backpack to the offices, though I suppose I could use them more on weekends.

-- gabbneb, Thursday, September 27, 2007 4:20 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

http://legilimens.org/abstract/_img_scaps/ap-11.jpg

Who cares if there is a nalgene at your desk instead of a bottled water though?

I don't think "Who cares" is really the right question, but it's moot anyway - I don't put a water bottle of any kind on my desk. The purpose of bottled water afaic is portability. If I am inside, I drink tap water. If I am outside, unless I am hiking or it's extremely hot, I don't need a quart of water.

that one guy otm

I'm sort of with gab on the casual/recreational life vs office time, actually, I just don't happen to think that drinking out of a Nalgene qualifies as "embarrassing". My friend has a nice glass, like a pint glass with a nice molded decoration that's always clean and pretty...it's a nice touch to sit down to.

It just seems more dangerous to have a glass on your desk that could get knocked over than something with a cap. I am not the type to live on the edge. ha ha

But anyway, I DO drink tap water - I just put it in my nalgene. And I like to have water with me whereever I go. I get thirsty. To each his/her own.

there is no room for anything on my desk. I balance cups of water on my left elbow. I am x-treme.

I don't get That One Guy's picture post. Explain!

i was saying gabbneb is kind of bateman-y.

I reuse a Nantucket Nectars bottle for desk water. I fill it up every day from the kitchen refrigerator.

xpost It's from American Psycho, Sarah.

fwiw, "Fiji" water comes from a well outside of Basalt, CO. When I lived there(-ish), there was a big debate in the paper about ppl walking around with bottles of Fiji water when, you know, that was PRECISELY THE SAME WATER as their tap water. Also some issues with water rights/access that I don't recall, but those are always a big deal in the high-desert.

my pet peeve, aside from bottled water itself: I've seen a few (Fiji, at least) that label their stuff with the word "artesian," which I guess makes dumb people think that it's like hand-crafted or something. So fucking stupid.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artesian_aquifer

Nalgene sounds like something you'd put in a douche.

Wait, Evan, I just read a whole article somewhere (the one above?) about the village on island of Fiji where the water comes from, and what that means for the local residents...this is rly from CO?? I'm misunderstanding something, methinks....

Fiji is headquartered in Basalt, but claims the water comes from an aquifer in Fiji. How do you know otherwise?

btw yes gabbneb thanks for the link to artesian aquifers DUH THAT WAS MY POINT

nb: i only skimmed the article, so i missed the part about the water coming from fiji. i swear i read articles in both of aspen's daily newspapers that had something to do with water rights and fiji, so i assumed it meant that the artesian well from which they were obtaining this water was near basalt.

looks like i am wrong!

n/m. tho my point about "artesian" water still stands.

http://aspentimes.com/article/20041029/NEWS/110290027

Maybe someone already said this, but most bottled water doesn't contain fluoride. Fluoride = bad for you.

Those of you who refill bought water bottles shouldn't do so for very long. It's a breeding ground for bacteria especially around the mouth. You could wash them out very well each night but for all that just go buy a non-disposable one.

I buy a new disposable bottle every two or three days and then re-fill it from the filtered water I keep in the fridge at work or the filtered water dispensed from our fridge. I don't drink unfiltered tap water unless I have no choice.

I'm constantly thirsty due to medication and must always have a bottle of water with me no matter what. The odd water fountain (and they are few and far between these days) just won't cut it. I do need to get a non-disposable one though but the ones I've tried so far have tasted funny and plastic-y. I shall renew my search.

I think somewhere on ILX we have an old post from take-no-prisoners rock and roll beard master hstencil himself stating that fiji water tastes pretty damn good. I have to agree. Maybe not $5 worth of good since it has no ethanol in it but still.

...which is funny, because as an elementary school student, me and the other three "country" kids in my class had to step into the hall during milk break to take shots of fluoride mouthwash, because our wells didn't have fluoride

Fluoridation is a communist conspiracy to contaminate our precious bodily fluids.

big xposts

Misery, get a metal bottle. They're just as light as plastic, and they won't give you cancer.

HEARSAY: apparently you're not supposed to use Nalgenes after they've been scratched up on the inside (which is likely if you've gotten rocks/dirt/gravel in them while camping), because it releases potentially carcinogenic compounds.

btw yes gabbneb thanks for the link to artesian aquifers DUH THAT WAS MY POINT

my understanding is that it's a not-insignificant part of the Fiji brand that the water contains minerals from being drawn through the rock.

That not keeping a reusable bottle of water on your desk thing is baffling to me. My sigg is keeping me company as I type and most people at my work have Nalgenes on their desk at all times.

Misery, get a metal bottle. They're just as light as plastic, and they won't give you cancer.

Guys, I can't speak highly enough of Sigg and no, I don't work for them. They're cute, don't leak, and keep things really cold. http://www.mysigg.com/

Misery, get a metal bottle.

Yes, this is what I'm thinking.

Haha, we didn't have fluoridated water either but no one made us take any (except at the dentist, and it burned the HELL out of my mouth, I could feel that shit for hours).

http://www.mysigg.com/ProductImages/MYSIGG/8005.80.JPG

I don't drink out of campstove fuel bottles.

Those head tops are freaking me out. . .

gabbneb, i'm starting to think that no one cares what you drink out of

I don't carry around any of my several nalgenes for the same reason I don't wear hiking boots or a backpack to the offices

Yea this is just silly.

i have to get around some day to my favorite bottled water poll. there are sooooo many.

Surely you mean your favorite bottled water troll?

i heard gabbneb drinks his bottled water out of a cauldron

I heard it was a propane tank and the truck comes twice a month to refill it with water filtered from the tears of Trappist monks who eat nothing but mountain breezes.

http://www.angio.net/~lukesos/Pictures/Rainier2000/Hector_fuel_bottles.jpg

edward siggerhands

Can you get those Sigg bottles basically anywhere or just online?

You can also ring up Sigue Sigue Sputnik and ask them to bring you one

which actually brings up a really good point, I will not buy any $20 metal thermos until I can have one with the cover of Flaunt It on the side

defend the indefensible: designer waterbottles wtf

http://www.jeffbots.com/sigueX2sputnik.jpg

seriously why was this not my lunchbox as a kid? why did I have to settle for fucking garfield? no wonder I hate myself

I just bought one. All of you STFU.

http://www.bottleyourbrand.com/private-label-bottled-water.asp

nebbish, that's a sigg drinking bottle not a sigg/msr fuel bottle.

nebbish, huh. I should use a sierra club cup at work. https://secure2.convio.net/sierra/site/Ecommerce/8681711?VIEW_PRODUCT=true&product_id=1401&store_id=1621

Only the best for you http://www.msrcorp.com/cookware/titan_cup.asp

http://www1.istockphoto.com/file_thumbview_approve/966751/2/istockphoto_966751_hands_cupped_with_clipping_path.jpg

hey what up you picky douchebags

tap water in southern california is very "hard", ie its filled with salts of minerals like calcium and magnesium. it's fine for doing dishes and cooking but it makes tea and coffee taste really nasty and it's not very nice to drink. so please don't be tut-tutting over the popularity of bottled water in hollywood please take that into account.

OTOH i can't really afford $2 per day on bottled water so i buy distilled water for 35 cents a gallon (refilled at the grocery store) and then fill a nalgene every day.

the clear nalgenes *might* have some nasty chemicals in them, although nobody has really convincingly shown how the nasty stuff (bisphenol A) might get into the water, short of exposing it to heat or sunlight for a long time. if you want to be really safe just get a "cloudy" nalgene bottle instead of a colored clear bottle because those don't leach any chemicals into the water.

i might get a SIGG just because the stainless steel will be easier to keep clean and odor free - the nalgene gets sorta smelly after a few months, especially if i leave water in there for more than 24 hours. i have to wash it with soap about once a week to keep it nice, while the stainless stuff you just need to rinse w/ hot water regularly.

Can you get those Sigg bottles basically anywhere or just online?

I got mine a while ago on ebay but you can order online and I noticed that Whole Foods is selling them now.

defend the indefensible: designer waterbottles wtf

I'll defend them - they're worth every penny. They're pretty much indestructable, keep things really cold, do not leak, and will last for a very long time.

hey what up you picky douchebags

I wish I could change my username!

Phthalate talk is making me worry more about the time I bought bottled water and every glassful had solid white powdery residue at the bottom.

I started drinking a lot of bottled water when I cut out Coke etc; I've been trying to switch to tap water, but it would be a whole lot easier if the tap water here wasn't kind of greyish with visible particles floating and didn't need the tap run for two minutes before pouring and then drinking immediately to stop it tasting nasty. Not sure if this is the local water supply or the pipes in this house.

Yes, I do know I am a bad person.

tap water in southern california is very "hard", ie its filled with salts of minerals like calcium and magnesium. it's fine for doing dishes and cooking but it makes tea and coffee taste really nasty and it's not very nice to drink. so please don't be tut-tutting over the popularity of bottled water in hollywood please take that into account.

-- moonship journey to baja

Really? We were drinking straight and with tea in Jan and it tasted just fine. Perhaps Sydney water is worse.

Maybe you shouldn't live in a fucking desert.

[ / sandy douche ]

(actually I have no idea if hard water has anything to do with that, in fact it probably doesn't)

The tap water here tastes REALLY GOOD but there's tons of old gas stations that have been converted into "get yr reverse osmosis water here for 35 cents a gallon" here OR venmachines that fill up yr reverse osmosis water. I never got the point of it, and the article points out it does take up a lot of energy. Esp. my mum-in-law who'd drive 15 minutes every day to her "favorite one," insisting on giving even her dog the reverse osmosis water.

Water, poorer-tasting tap water, tastes way better if left in the fridge overnight. Maybe it's just because it's ++cold but it is yum.

I will only be buying a cute metal bottle when I have some expectation that I won't lose any coffee mug or water bottle I carry around with me within two weeks. I.e. never.

Our water does have floaty bits in it but that's just what makes the water hard (minerals)...the water in Las Cruces comes from an aquifer and then our recycled water goes to El Paso citizens! Haha.

lol a point about reusing water bottles and refrigerating them - as the water cools the particulates settle to the bottom of the container, which is one reason for poorer-tasting tap water, tastes way better if left in the fridge overnight

until you get to the bottom of the bottle and then URP weird flavors come right back atcha. this is especially true if you keep refilling and refrigerating like I was doing for a while with 4 different bottles on rotation. yikes @ trace metals iced tea

DREGS

Hello doesnt anyone buy Brita filter jugs or anything?

Brita makes a pretty cheap faucet attachment now that lasts like 6 months - it is disposable, but you're just throwing away one fairly small thing every 6 months or so, which is probably not even as much garbage as the filters from the jugs create.

Even better. I mean I'm not understanding the "our tap water is shit" argument when filters are readily available.

...esp since lots of bottle water (Aquifina, for example) actually is just filtered tap water.

Before I moved to California, I would never drink tap water. It just tasted terrible. But the tap water in San Francisco is SO GOOD, I don't have to use a filter or reverse osmosis or anything. Last month, I took a trip up to see where our water comes from (among other things). Although the Hetch Hetchy reservoir is in the middle of a beautiful wilderness, I still think that the folks who want to demolish the O'Shaughnessy Dam are crazy wackos.

Speaking from personal experience, San Diego tap water makes you go through Brita filters at twice the prescribed rate (attributable to its hardness). Calcium deposits form a visible crust on your faucet and stuff. So yeah, as Hurting2 recommended, I got out of the fucking desert.

yeah brita doesn't do shit to l.a. water tastewise, we tried it for a few months and it was still like drinking out of a pool. i'll try double filtering.

I was recently in Portugal on vacation and there were no water fountains anywhere. I ended up generally filling my water bottles in public washrooms sinks whenever I came across one. Pretty much every other tourist I saw was walking around with a disposable plastic water bottle. The whole thing seemed so wasteful. The tap water was very drinkable everywhere I went so I just don't understand why there aren't water fountains all over the place as seems to be common in most of North America.

This drives me insane too (bottled water, not particularly the lack of specified water fountains, but sure). In Argentina recently we got two big bottles of water when we got there and filled them from sinks for the rest of the trip.

I think it was euler that alerted me to this, but Paris has public water fountains everywhere and a lot of SPARKLING WATER fountains. It is the absolute best thing ever. Oddly enough it has become our favorite thing to do in Paris, going to the sparkling water fountains and filling up our bottles.

Yes! Local people know about them (you see people with big bags of empty bottles coming for refills) but they're not yet part of the tourist agenda here, the way they seem to be in Rome.

My mother-in-law and her partner constantly brag about how sustainable their lifestyle is. They refuse to drink tap water and fly twenty times a year to faraway places then copiously bitch about how their 2-3 months of vacation aren't enough.

I have always been surprised how there are rarely/few people around filling up water. I think we have been to 6 different locations now.

The one by the BNF, which has multiple spigots for both fizzy & tap water, is pretty well used ime. The one by me, by contrast, is mostly used by migrants as a urinal. "the other paris"...

I've been to the one by the BNF and maybe one person used it while we were there. This time around we went to the one on Canal Saint-Martin and one in a park near metro Stalingrad.

the one near Stalingrad is probably the one by me? where the park is full of laundry hung on makeshift lines? well, you have to go past the fountain further into the park to see all that. I have taken water from it too; people piss in the place where the overspill collects, not on the faucet.

I think? It's below Stalingrad near Louis Blanc, the neughborhood was def. more immigranty. I didn't know you lived near there. We should've had drinks (although I think you may have been in Bretagne).

the park very near me is the Jardin d'Éole, north of Stalingrad. near Louis Blanc is quite a bit nicer, I didn't know there were fountains there, but I'll look (about a 5 minute walk for me to LB). Hit me up when you're here, I'd be happy to have a drink.

Ok, I just looked at the water map and it was the one in Jardin d'Éole. For some reason I thought it was below the metro line.

This drives me insane too (bottled water, not particularly the lack of specified water fountains, but sure)

The thing about water fountains is that it encourages people to refill their bottles. I got occasional weird looks when filling my water bottle in a public washroom so I would guess pretty much nobody except me did this.

I was working this conservation conference once and we had removed all the bottled water (there were water refill stations) and all the single serve items from the food places. It was hilarious how many people asked us where they could buy bottled water, being upset that there wasn't any and then looking chagrined after we explained why.

Sparkling water fountains !!!

Why is this not regularly listed as a benefit of carbon capture.