You should try the hot water thing if you haven't actually done so. The cost is pretty much zero.

Have you tried filtering your water, or drinking it very cold? Water tastes like what's in it, and the taste varies depending on the source. Most city water tastes like the chemicals they use to clean it, while water from a cheap filter tastes like nothing. Cold water also seems to have less taste, or at least I've found I can't detect the taste of cold water (as in, with ice in it, not just cold from the tap).

Seltzer (Or whatever they called carbonated water in your part of the world) is another "almost-water" drink, much like tea. No calories, enough taste to notice, feels like soda.

Interesting. I started disliking whole milk soon after I switched to soy milk. Some report the same reaction after switching to rice milk. There are "lite" versions which, while not a substitute for water, could be an alternative to juice.

Taste preferences are malleable, though. I grew up drinking skim milk, and switched over to whole milk when I left for college. I grew a love for the taste of delicious, delicious fats in my drinks.

The first step was switching to higher-fat milk in eating bowls of cereal. It's a good way to get used to the taste while tricking your brain into not noticing the 'weird' texture.

Switching to a high-fat diet helped too. Whole milk really isn't all that fatty - half and half is better, and heavy cream is a bit much straight (I can drink it straight, but it is way too easy to give my digestive system too much to handle).

There's nothing inherent about preferences. If you want to include milk as party of a healthy diet, you may as well prefer healthier milk.

If you're not trying to lose weight, then no reason at all. If you prefer skim milk, then by all means drink it. However, assuming

1. You are lactose tolerant
2. You are trying to lose weight

Then you're better off switching to products like whole milk or, better yet, heavy cream, that provide a higher proportion of calories from fat (trans fats excepted, but those aren't typically present in milk) and less to none from carbohydrates and protein.

Also, after a little googling, I so see that some people have raised concerns about possible health effects arising from the industrial production of skim milk. It seems farmers don't just skim the cream off like I thought, but add various other things like milk solids and Vitamin A and D back in. At first glance, the evidence of harmful effects from this doesn't seem compelling--mostly extrapolations from animal studies and hypothesized biochemical causal chains that aren't actually tied to overall mortality rates, quality of life, or anything else we care about. However, it is suggestive that this subject might be worthy of further research.