This all started because I was thinking about what sort of reaction you would have gotten oh say 25 years ago if you had told people they would buying water at the grocery store. They would have locked you up and flushed the key.
But now it looks like my dire prediction about paying to breathe is coming true. Well not exactly but close enough.
You may remember about ten years ago there was a short lived fad where oxygen was dispensed in bars. People sat around and inhaled pure O2 instead of smoking and for a while it was quite popular. But it was a fad and soon disappeared.
But now a company in Canada has devised a personal sized oxygen inhaler. The company’s founder came up with idea while traveling in Hong Kong noticing the air quality signs showing the day’s air pollution. So he started making OXIA oxygen inhalers.
Now these sleek silver and black hand held cylinders bear as much resemblance to the green oxygen canisters that seniors drag around behind them as a Ferrari does to a taxi cab . The Oxia devices aren’t exactly cheap either, retailing at about 60 bucks for 12 to fifteen sniffs, depending I guess on the size of your lungs.
So for right now I guess you won’t be seeing them on the shelves of Seven Elevens. But like bottled water, my bet is that it won’t be all that long before we hit the drive thru at the golden arches and ask for a side of O2 along with our Big Mac.
Just another sign post on the slippery slope to the warm place.
