No sooner had I reported on the Way of Life drinks that have been created to cynically target thirsty martial artists, than TokyoTimes is describing Pet Sweat.
The claim is that it's an isotonic drink for dogs — ideal for budo-dogs during intensive training in the doggie dojo.
Anyone who has trained in — or, indeed, just been to — Japan will be familiar with Pocari Sweat. Pocaris are large, sloth-like creatures that up until modern times used to live quiet, undisturbed lives in the forested mountains of the northern parts of Japan. Now, few remain in the wild. Mostly they are cultivated in huge industrial cage-farms kept artificially hot, with suction pumps attached to their sweat-glands. This sorry state of affairs is a direct result of the unrelenting demand for isotonic drinks. Obviously, this raises the troubling question of how exactly these bottles of Pet Sweat are being filled. Dogs, even the sturdy Japanese Akita, are considerably smaller than the shambling Pocari. The lines of cages must run for miles.