So, a few nights back I had the opportunity to do some work with some friends. A couple of us in the group really like Port so that was the drink of choice. Personally, I love Port.
Another friend brought over Havarti cheese.
Now, I am violently lactose intolerant. I used to term it lactose incompetent. The former meaning you couldn’t stand something; the latter meaning you couldn’t do something basic like other people, like in my case… process it.
However, over the last few years I’ve transitioned from incompetent into full on intolerance. Now the strong smell of cheese will make me queasy.
But back to the Havarti. See, some cheeses are made from goat’s milk. One example of this is Feta. Actually, most Greek and Mediteranian cheeses are this way. Goat’s milk based cheeses don’t have the lactose sugar in it. My body doesn’t have the enzymes to break down the lactose sugars. Effectively, I get a milk product and it spoils in my stomach. Goat milk based product? No problem.
Once again to the Havarti. Well, I’d had one more glass of port that I typically would in an evening and was feeling…well, happy. I noticed the cheese was Havarti and I was very… VERY happy. I used to love, strike that… ADORE cheese. Not anymore. So I sliced off a wedge. Heavenly. Okay..maybe too heavenly. The Port helped it taste that much better. I had about 3 healthy slices.
Did I mention my spiderman-like cheese sense. See if a cheese has lactose, the smell is repugnant. Well, most of the times. Sometimes I build up a small stock of enzymes. They aren’t really enough to do much but they make the suffering a little less annoying. When the enzymes build up, lactose cheese isn’t quite so horrifying. Lots of Havarti. Yum.
So… later, we go do some temple work. This usually involves sitting in a nice, quiet temple like room while people recite poetry or some such. Towards the end my body got…weird. REALLY weird.
And now some TMI…