ICED TEA WILL NOW KILL YOU

Doctors traced an Arkansas man’s kidney failure to an unusual cause – he drank a gallon of iced tea each day. The unidentified 56-year-old man went to a hospital last May with nausea, weakness, fatigue and body aches. Doctors determined his kidneys were badly clogged and inflamed by the food chemical called oxalate. Besides black tea, oxalate is found in spinach, rhubarb, nuts, wheat bran and chocolate. In rare cases, too much oxalate can lead to kidney trouble. He said he drank about 16 8-ounce cups of iced tea every day. At 16 cups of iced black tea each day, he was taking in three to 10 times more oxalate than the average American. The man is now on dialysis, perhaps for the rest of his life. Said one of the doctors, “I wouldn’t tell people to stop drinking tea, but what the man drank is a lot of tea.”
* Oxalate is in chocolate, too? Thanks for that. Thanks a lot.
* I’m still gonna eat the ears off my chocolate rabbit on Sunday.
* On the other hand, cutting back on the spinach and rhubarb? No problem.
* I always worry when I hear the phrase “food chemical.”
* So, take that you teetotalers out there.
* Now I see what that word means: He drank the tea and it totaled him.
* Quick, get him a beer immediately.
* You know what I always say: You can’t have too much moderation.