Seriously. Drink water. Right now. The most abundant tissue in the human body is this stuff called connective tissue; the main component of connective tissue is something called “ground substance,” which is mostly just water with some proteins floating in it. When we’re dehydrated the ground substance gets sticky and thick, much like soup with too little water. Because connective tissue (CT) is everywhere in the body, that impedes our movements (tendons and ligaments are CT), our organ function (the outer lining of our organs is CT), and even our mental cognition (the axons of each nerve are wrapped in a myelin sheath made out of–you guessed it–CT).
Keep a full water bottle near you at all times and take periodic sips; keep one in the car, at your workspace, beside your bed; set alarms for yourself if you must. Do whatever it takes, but drink more water. The Mayo Clinic says that female-sized people should be drinking 9 cups of water* and male-sized people should be drinking 13 cups a day.
(And no, coffee doesn’t count. Caffeine dehydrates us, so that cancels out the liquid portion of the coffee and gives us a zero sum. Alcohol is worse: for every alcoholic drink, you need to drink a glass of water in order to balance out.)
Keep your soup runny, my friends!