Gratitude Monday -- It's Wine O' Clock Again

For Christmas Eve dinner this past season, along with the roasted turkey and wildcrafted cranberry sauce, we had a glass of wine.
It was good.
Back in the old days I could hold my liquor with the best of them. I don't know that's anything to brag about, but neither is it a point of shame. It was a simple fact and I relate it for a reason.
One fine day I developed a number of food allergies including to alcohol. Not only could I get looped on the mere smell of it, I couldn't even handle de-alcoholized beer.
It was sad.
I'd have the occasional snort of something at bed time, or perhaps a swallow or two of wine of an occasion, but that was it. Any more and I'd be unable to control what I said. Also, liquor makes me red from ear to ear. For some "getting a glow on" is figurative. For me, literal.
Several months ago I decided to honour my gluten intolerance just to see what would happen. I followed the blog Wheat Belly and learned many things about wheat and gluten.
Commenters noted food allergies clearing up.
I wondered.
Then one day shortly before Christmas I looked in a little-consulted kitchen drawer. What should I find but a bottle of  3 Blind Moose merlot we'd purchased in a Montana service station a few years back.
On Christmas Eve afternoon I popped it in the refrigerator for a few hours to bring it below room temperature. My husband cracked the bottle near meal time to give it time to breathe, and then poured us each a generous glass.
For the first time in years I
a) finished the whole glass
b)drained mine before he'd finished his
c)was still sober
I glowed a lovely flame red from it, but it didn't matter. I tolerated it.
So thrilled was I that Saturday evening I decided to have another to help me enjoy the fourth season opener of Fringe. I only had a half-glass, but it was enough to satisfy me that Christmas Eve was not an anomaly.
It's wine o'clock in my house again.