ICE WATER! It belongs to our age of modern conveniences, of cleverly contrived appliances - a time and place where all but the most humble of us have easy access to the frozenness and drink-chilling properties of ice! WATER! coaxed down below that magical point of temperature beneath which its molecules slow their restless agitated vibrations and solidity sets in. ICE! Form of - an ICE CUBE! Perfect delivery system for conveying the FREEZING POWER of the icebox, gently, into one's beverage. Wide surface areas, to conduct the delicious chill into the surrounding liquid, but with a large interior volume in which to store coldness that lasts. A veritable reservoir of REFRESHING COLD - floating in your drink, gradually releasing its heat-fighting coldness as it melts! Ahh.
I think some of us out there may be guilty of taking this frigid and pristine marvel of modernity for granted! Why, thousands of years ago, at the height of the so-called cradle of civilization, if a King wanted ice he had to dispatch a runner to hie himself off to the nearest mountaintop! And then, back twice as fast bearing that heavy, precious, rapidly-diminishing burden - a block of melting ICE - on his back! The poor runner had to haul ass all the way back to the city, running hard and hot through the dusty heat of the road, bent with his frozen burden - not refreshing at all to him, but a numbing weight and pain pressing through! - with every moment's delay making his effort count for less. Less of this precious cargo, meant for the delectation and refreshment of his cruel and regal oppressor. And when he returned with the prize, would he share in the refreshment? Would a cool drink be his reward? After his sore exertions? HAH! Fat chance!
Of course, the way back was presumably more downhill than otherwise, at least. So that's something.
THINK! Next time you enjoy a cold drink cooled with copious cubes and crushed shards of ICE! Think! Next time you take your glass of room-temperature soon-to-be-beverage, and drop cube after cube of ICE into it, thrilling to the stiff brittle SNAP and CRACK as the cold cube reacts to the shock of warmness, tasted now for the first time since its liquid infancy! Before the tray. Before the freezing dark.
Think about how, holding this simple glass, this miracle of ICE WATER, you could have walked among the rude tribes of our ancestors scrabbling amidst the hot dust and clay that would eventually come to underlie the vast columns of civilization itself, and be revered as a god.
At least until the ice melted. Then you'd be pretty much fucked. They'd kill you and worship your glass.
That's why I say: screw your fancy time machines. Just give me a tall glass of ICE WATER. Ahhhhh.
TO SCIENCE!!!
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