Before you twist any dials, you need a baseline. Grab a water hardness test strip from your local hardware store—they cost about the same as a fancy latte and work in seconds. Dip it in a glass of tap water, wait for the color change, and match it to the chart. Boom: your GPG is revealed, like a secret handshake between you and your pipes.
Alternatively, look up your city’s water quality report online. These are public documents, often written in dry bureaucratese, but they hold the key to your setting. For example, if your report says “120 mg/L,” multiply by 0.07 to get roughly 8.4 GPG. Math is annoying, but so is a shower that feels like you’re rinsing in chalk dust.
Cultural reference moment: In the UK, where water hardness varies from Edinburgh’s soft rain to London’s iconic “hard” Thames, locals often joke about tea tasting different depending on the postcode. Your softener setting is the difference between a perfect cuppa and a tragic, scummy brew.
