By Chip Byteley
Move over, artisanal coffee and $20 avocado toast. There’s a new status symbol in town: gourmet water. Yes, you read that right. The humble, essential-for-life liquid has gotten a luxury makeover, and your dusty tap water just won’t cut it anymore.
“It’s not just about H2O,” insists Sebastian Snoblington, renowned “Water Sommelier” (a profession we didn’t know existed until five minutes ago). “We’re talking terroir, mouthfeel, the very essence of the source!”
Forget boring aquifers. Gourmet water is sourced from the most pristine, remote locations: icebergs hand-harvested by synchronized swimmers, clouds wept by Scandinavian angels, even lunar springs, if the price tag is astronomical enough.
Each bottle boasts a tasting profile that would make a wine critic blush. “Notes of glacial moss with a hint of ancient regret linger on the palate,” Sebastian waxes poetic about a particularly pricey bottle.
Of course, the wellness angle is heavily exploited. There’s “mindfulness-enhancing” water, “DNA-repairing” water, and even one suspiciously murky version that claims to boost your creativity by “replicating the exact mineral ratio found in Beethoven’s bathtub.”
Naturally, the price tag is outrageous, as is the packaging. Forget plastic; gourmet water comes in hand-blown crystal bottles adorned with ethically sourced unicorn tears (probably).
Yet, the tragically hip are lapping it up. Celebs swear by it, social media influencers pose with bottles more expensive than your rent. Gourmet water is the ultimate conspicuous consumption, because what says “I have disposable income to burn” more than paying $60 for something that falls freely from the sky?
Whether this trend is a flash-in-the-pan or the start of a global water-snob takeover remains to be seen. One thing’s for sure: if you’re sipping unfiltered tap water, you’re practically a peasant. Time to dust off your finest crystal goblet and prepare to get fleeced in the name of hydration.
Liv N. Large 
Polly Tickle