Last week while browsing the aisles in Costco, I discovered and purchased a 64 oz. bottle of Mighty Mango, one of the Naked juice flavors.

It was delicious. I only needed to dilute it half-and-half to get a great flavor and the benefit of a thick drink. Why a thick drink, you ask?

A thickened drink, i.e., almost anything thicker than water, does not set off my cough response. I am very sensitive to drinking water from a cup. I just now coughed only thinking about drinking plain water.

BTW, researchers have posited that thickened liquids, in taking more time to go down the throat, give a person time to prepare for the event. Water, it seems, goes down so fast that it surprises the system.

Yesterday, once again at Costco, I purchased two more 64 oz. Mighty Mango bottles.

Today, I drank my half-and-half juices. Then, while stopping at a bakery for post-Thanksgiving pie, I got a free cookie. Yum. Sugary.

While driving with my mother to Ralphs, I suddenly had a weird feeling. Even though I was wearing great glare-reducing sunglasses, everything seemed too bright. I worried a bit that I might be passing out.

But I continued on to Ralphs, drank water and then, as usual, per my low blood pressure, I got out of the car very slowly. I was wobbly in Ralphs for a couple of minutes, and then I began to feel better.

I instantly decided that my wife was right this morning when she told me to be careful about drinking sugary drinks. When I got home, I lay on the bed and confessed just those sentiments.

Yes, in a 64 oz. bottle of Mighty Mango, with no sugar added, there are 240 grams of sugar – all from fruit. In one ounce of the drink there are 3.75 grams of sugar. That’s 9/10 of a teaspoon of sugar – not so bad, I figured, as I made my new drink plan.

My plan, which I started this afternoon, is to add a shot glass (one ounce) of Mighty Mango juice to an 8 oz. glass of water.

At that rate, hopefully three beautiful things will happen.

• One, I will not cough because the mixture is a bit thickened.
• Two, I will not have a sugar reaction.
• Three, I will save money.

If I use one ounce of Mighty Mango at breakfast, and one ounce during the day, that comes to 60 oz. per month. My one big six-dollar bottle should last me a month.

Mary Poppins said, “A teaspoon of sugar makes the medicine go down.”

Maybe, my teaspoon of Mighty Mango sugar, will make the water go down. Bottoms up!

Mr. Ebsen may be contacted at robertzebsen51@gmail.com