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Written by Terry Sweeney

Ah...the joy of wine!!! In its warm fuzzy afterglow, how different the world looks and sounds.! Is that my neighbor’s ear-shattering leaf blower I hear?! Not after several glasses of Louis Latour 2006 Vire Clesse.! More like the gentle buzz of a thousand honey bees.! What’s that I see in my yard?! Did some trashy passerby toss his empty crushed Budweiser can into my azaleas?! <!--more-->Another glass of my delicious Louis Latour and suddenly I see it more as a chic aluminum ‘object-de-garden-art’ by renowned German sculptor Anhauser Busch.! And as for myself, all my flaws and imperfections seem to melt away (especially after several more snootfuls).! It must be obvious to anyone with eyes, Monsieur Latour tells me, that I am at the ‘top of my game’, the ‘peak of my intellectual powers’ and the very embodiment of ‘worldly wisdom’.! Obvious to anyone but Lanier, who has the nerve to say to me: “You’re slurring, I think you oughta slow down on the vino.” ! !! “WHAT?! What did you just shay?!” I ask, fuming with the kind of righteous overreaction that only a drunk can muster. !!! “I’m just saying I think you might wanna give it a rest,” says Lanier, quietly. ! !!! Well, that timid suggestion is all it takes for The Mean Glass to come banging on my door, demanding satisfaction. “YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR PROBLEM IS?” I hiss. “YOU’RE A CONTROL FREAK!” This to someone who, only minutes before, I saw as near to perfect as a human can be. ! !!! Ask any married couple, and they’ll tell you.! When the Mean Glass hits, RUN!!! Sometimes it’s you, sometimes it’s them, and no one ever knows just what might set it off.!! Our friend Kathy reported to us one of her recent Mean Glass moments. She and her British husband were having a lovely evening, when he sweetly suggested that she “Ease up on the Pinot Grigio.”! Her response? “YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR PROBLEM IS? YOU’RE ENGLISH!! F---- YOU AND F---- YOUR COUNTRY!” !!! “Not exactly the high point of our marriage,” says Kathy, sheepishly. !!!! “YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR PROBLEM IS?!” remains the universal battle cry of the Mean Glass and is almost always followed by the nonsensical insult.! Once when Lanier politely implied, after a boozy night out on the town, that I didn’t really need to open a new bottle of wine at midnight, I aristocratically tossed out at him “YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR PROBLEM IS? YOU ARE SOOOO MIDDLE CLASS!”! Totally overlooking the fact that I’m the son of a Long Island butcher and his Sicilian fishwife and Lanier’s the direct descendant of Sir Nicholas Lanier, ‘Master of the King’s Music’ to King Charles II. !!!! The Mean Glass doesn’t care whom it says what to.! Basically its evil plan is to drive your loved one as far away as possible so the road is clear for a return trip to Wineville... without them sticking their big fat nose in your wine glass.! But are you really mad at them?! Nah.! Deep down you know you love them and you feel safe enough to let off a little steam, saying to them what you couldn’t say to your boss, your mother in law, that pain-in-the-butt client, or any number of petty tyrants who walk all over your world all day long.! So next time when you gently ask! your mate: “Don’t you think you’ve had enough?” and they answer out of the blue: “LET’S GET A DIVORCE, SELL EVERYTHING AND SPLIT IT DOWN THE MIDDLE!”... know it’s really just their way of saying: “I want another glass of wine (no matter how many I’ve already had!)”. !!!! The Mean Glass is, of course, not to be confused with The Horny Glass which one usually

hits late in a raucous cocktail party or late night at a restaurant that's turned into a bar.! Our friend Liza says she always knows when it hits because "I'm suddenly attracted to every man in the room EXCEPT my husband."! Usually that leads to some guilty confession the next morning. "Honey, last night when I was out with the girls I ended up kissing some guy at the bar and I just wanted you to hear about it from me first.! It meant absolutely nothing." And it didn't, because it wasn't really you. It was The Horny Glass that had momentarily taken possession of your lips.! Blessedly, you often don’t remember who or what the Horny Glass told you to do.! Which means it doesn’t count! !!!!! Not to be forgotten is The Weepy Glass, which can occur about 2 1/2 hours into a joy-filled wine party.! When this strikes, it's best to just sneak away from the hapless 'Weepy Glass' victim as there is no amount of logic or common sense that will make this person stop crying.! They just need to get that emotional lump out of their throat and will awake happy and refreshed in the morning without any help from you.! Some people use the Weepy Glass as a way to deal with problems without paying a shrink.! We all have that special tearjerker of a tune that we play over and over again once we’ve had the Weepy Glass (mine’s ‘Moon River’).!! My cousin Carol says she once woke up at dawn on the floor in front of her CD player with her arm outstretched and her finger still touching the button; she had obviously replayed Edith Piaf’s ‘La Vie En Rose’ till she (ahem) 'fell asleep' next to her empty, overturned wine bottle. "It was humiliating, to say the least, but I’d finally cried my divorce out and felt better than I had in months!" confesses Carol. “And I don’t even understand a word of French!”. !!!!! So whether it’s the bad boy Mean Glass, the oversexed Horny Glass, or the old self pitying ‘swallow and wallow’ Weepy Glass that decides to spend the night; just remember...they’ll be gone and forgotten in the morning.! Hopefully, most of all, by the person you may or may not still be married to!

Cheers!

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