We could tell you that you need to drink water, but you already know that by now. The real struggle is remembering to do it before it’s too late. When you hunker down in Van Pelt, hours can go by without you getting up to get a drink. And if you forget your bottle in your room and don’t want to fork over $2.99 to purchase the environmental bomb that is bottled water, you're pretty much parched. As the outside air gets colder, the inside air dryer and the compulsion to drink coffee higher, hydration will only be more crucial though reaching for ice cold fluids may not be your first instinct. So what’s one to do? Invest in this technology that tells you when to drink water.
WaterApp, $1: While an app that tracks your water intake and reminds you to drink more seems idiotically simple, sometimes just being aware of your habits helps you change them. If you only want to see how you're doing and don’t want to invest in a ton of tech, the WaterApp is good place to start. Rated four stars in the app store, the program allows you to set your desired water break intervals and will notify you on your mobile device when it's time to drink it up. After downing those eight ounces, fill up a glass in the app and at the end of the week, you can check how you did. Could you track alcohol with this too? Yes. Just be prepared to handle the truth.
Healthy Water Drinking, $1.99: A little more high tech than the WaterApp, Healthy Water Drinking suggests how much water you should be drinking based off your amount of daily activity. It also lets you to track exactly how many milliliters you drank, rather than just say it was a glass.
Ulla, $24.99: Let’s be honest. If you don’t remember to drink water you probably won’t remember to track your consumption. The better solution is to be bullied by your water bottle. Enter Ulla, the non–waterproof device that straps around the bottle you already have. When the movement sensor realizes you haven’t picked up your drink in the last 30 to 40 minutes, it will urgently blink at you with intimidating colors until you chug the whole 24 ounces...or at least pretend to. Sounds like hazing, huh? On one hand, it’s nice that the makers didn’t build in a sound alarm, but on the other hand, a light can be easily ignored. Not cheap, but definitely worth it for those struggling with self–inflicted dehydration.
Hidrate, $55: If you still don’t own a reusable water bottle, tell yourself you have to buy one before you can order your Canada Goose this winter. You will feel just as lavish when you charge your credit card $55 for Hidrate Spark 2.0, a bottle that lights up, syncs with your phone and talks to you in Chris Hemsworth’s voice. Okay, we made up the last part. Still, this innovate bottle automatically tracks how many ounces of agua you consume and can sync this information on a variety of mobile devices, including Fitbit and Apple Watch.
When it deems you need to drink more, it will “glow” in the setting of
your choosing. How did humanity ever survive without this sort of
technology?
Confession: I failed to drink any water while writing this.
