At the end of 2016 I found out I was allergic to Prosecco.

I’ll just say that again for emphasis – I AM ALLERGIC TO PROSECCO.

I mean, of all the delicious, versatile, refreshing, goes-with-everything, everyone-offers-it-to-you-at-every-event-or-celebration-there-is, I had to go and be allergic to this one.

Part of trying to get a handle on why my skin was flaring up so much with psoriasis and hives led  me to a wonderful homeopath in Clontarf called Joy Lennon.

She allergy tested me for lots of different foods that I might be allergic to – some I already knew about, some foods that I had been avoiding I was surprised to hear wasn’t allergic to at all! But the major blow to my then almost-bride-to-be buzz was that I needed to stay away from Prosecco.

Joy obviously recognised a crest-fallen, prosecco-soaked woman when she saw one.

‘But you can drink vodka?’ she suggested. ‘Or gin?’

Gin and I had a relationship fraught with gay clubs oil dawn and day-after depression when I worked in New York and I haven’t touched a drop since. Vodka, though? Vodka, I could get down with.

I bought myself a nice bottle of Absolut on the way home from Tenerife recently and in all the talk of ‘Dry January’ that Ass Monkey (and the rest of the planet) has been going on with, I felt it only true and just that I come clear about my own commitment to the cause: I haven’t had a Dry January at all, but more of a Damp one.

I felt that bottle of Absolut deserved my attention.

I felt as though my Prosecco detox (going on 2 months now) deserves a (alcoholic) softening to the blow.

I feel as though January is a bell-end and what with all the grown-up stuff that I have committed to doing this year (I’m looking at YOU, attic floor of paperwork), I just think I am responsible enough for now, thank you.

So I’ve had a little ‘Reward Vodka’ every weekend in January – after we have the kids in bed on a Friday night, I pour myself a l’il tipple and I sip away, ignoring Ass ‘Smug As A Dry January Convert Can Be’ Monkey’s sideways glances.

Anyway, January is over now and with that will come The Piss Up Of The Century this weekend as hundreds of thousands of good Dry January-ers fill their Lidl trollies with bucket-loads of delicious cheap wine, and vow to never, ever give up drinking again.

And to that, I say Cheers.

Hic.

**DRINK RESPONSIBLY. That is all**