The line comes from the SpongeBob SquarePants episode Tea at the Treedome, first aired in 1999, where SpongeBob visits Sandy Cheeks at home and slowly dehydrates without his water helmet. Clips of his withered, gasping plea later spread across Vine, YouTube and meme pages as a shorthand for desperate wanting. The contrast between a simple glass of water and his dramatic collapse kept it reusable for food, shopping and fandom jokes, and the short isolated quote remains easy to drop into edits today.