Hydrating Smart Cup

I used to have a watch with a built-in altimeter (measuring altitude). Instead of a leather or rubber or nylon band with a clasp, it had an elastic band about an inch and a half wide, allowing me to slide it on over a winter coat and wear it on the outside. (Here's one on eBay without the elastic band.) I used to use it snowboarding, so I could see what the vertical drop was for various runs, and then optimize my day on the mountain through the highest possible vertical travel. The watch also had a nifty 'ski' function that, when activated, would monitor significant vertical gains and decreases, and automatically record the number of runs I made. This too would figure into my optimization calculations in my pursuit of statistically perfect recreation.

I hadn't thought of this watch in years, but remembered it a couple of weeks ago when I caught myself (again) nagging my fiancee to drink enough water. I'm of the camp that inadequate hydration is the largest health problem easily addressed. I think it contributes to everything from diminished fitness, to headaches, to elevated heartrate under moderate stress, to general malaise. I have only anecdotal evidence to back up my beliefs, but I don't bother with deep research in this case because what I'm advocating is not a step change in lifestyle, belief systems or even routine. I just think people should drink more water.

It's not unlike the Philosophy professor I had in college who addressed the issue of why he refused to disavow belief in God through simple logic. "You can't offer unequivocal proof that God exists, so it seems logical to dismiss his existence. But what if you're wrong?"

Indeed, hydration may have nothing to do with any of the symptoms I attribute to it. And downing another 4-5 glasses per day might have no affect on the quality of your life, or the lives of the people around you. But what if it does? I for one am not willing to take that risk, and maintain my solid faith that water = good; dehydration = ungood. And this faith is unslakable.

So here's the idea:
A Hydrating Smart Cup that automatically records how many glasses per day someone has drunk, through some sort of sensor/trigger that is tripped when the cup is full, and again when it is empty.  Place the cup on your desk or table and something on it will tell you how many glasses you've consumed that day. The trigger mechanism could either be electronic or (my preference) mechanical, and would have to allow for the fluctuations in water level that occur when people lift the cup to drink. True, the cup can't know if you spilled one or dumped it in the begonias. But you will, and you'll feel dirty and guilty for the rest of the day unless you down another cup off-the-clock to compensate.

There are a couple of solutions just now on the market that play in the same sandbox. One is this HydraCoach Intelligent Water Bottle. While it tracks water consumption throughout the day, it's designed primarily for use during exercise. The HydraCoach folks don't say as much, but it's a water bottle, not a cup. Bottles promote sipping, while most people drink. If I consumed all my daily water by sucking through a plastic nipple, my mouth would end up resembling a fish's. Commendable initiative, but too gadget-y and techy for me, even if I were a sipper and not a chugger. Plus the thing beeps at you to remind you to take a sip, as if your entire day were nothing but a series of wrong answers. That'd be enough to make me a water teetotaler.

The other solution I've found is altogether different, yet - to me - infinitely more elegant. It's the Google Water Tracker gadget, that you can install in your desktop or personal webpage. It's a small widget that simply asks if you're thirsty and allows you to check a box on the screen if you've consumed a cup of water. It's disadvantages are obvious - it only functions while you're in front of a computer. But it's heart is in the right place, and it promotes personal hydrating responsibility without reducing you to an automaton.

My idea, naturally, is superior. Or would be, if someone would take the initiative to implement it.

It might not even be a cup, incidentally. It might be an attachment that hangs inside of your favorite glass, with the trip sensor on the inside and the display on the outside. And it might be used not just to make sure you drink enough water, but also to help remind you when you've drunk too much of your vice beverage of choice, whether that's coffee or diet coke or lager.