Only the half of it

I only squeezed half of my escapades into yesterday’s blog post.

I forgot to tell you that I went to the 2023 ICC NSW Wine Awards with the Governor on Friday, fancy!

Well, I wasn’t sitting with Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC QC, but I could see her in the distance.

20 trophies were presented for the state’s best wines, including the NSW Governor’s Trophy for the 2023 NSW Wine of the Year’, presented by Margaret. She’s a tiny, intensely intelligent woman and she’d done lots of research on the birth of the wine industry, which she shared liberally during her speech.

The winner was Hunter Valley’s First Creek Wines with its 2022 Single Vineyard Wills Hill Road Chardonnay. A wine that Chair of Judges Nick Spencer described as “a wonderful and powerful example of Chardonnay with great concentration, length and phenolics.”

While I didn’t get to try it, damn, there were lots of other delicious wines delivered to my table and I consoled myself with a Gold medal winning Brokenwood Chardonnay while I ate fabulous food. ICC Sydney has really nailed its catering.

While the Hunter Valley claimed top honours, the other 15 winning wines on the day shone a light on wine regions across the state including Orange, Canberra District, Hilltops and the Riverina.

It’s a bit disappointing that more locals aren’t drinking our fabulous local wines – according to NSW Wine President Mark Bourne only 11.2 per cent of the wines on Sydney wine lists are from NSW.

Get into them!

Full results of the NSW Wine Awards available here for inspiration: https://nswwine.com.au/pages/results-wine-awards

I was feeling very jaunty as I wandered off into the late afternoon sun.

Then Saturday was spent oyster shucking and watching the Talking Heads doco and being hassled by a drunk Irishman.

On Sunday I walked with my friend Alice, went to the gym, then did a few hours slog on my book before heading to DD’s for an ocean splash, followed by steak and the Four Pines.

While that sounds relaxed, things took a stressful turn when I was switching the SIM card in my phone and accidentally dropped it down the gap between two boards on DD’s deck.

Argh!

I asked him where the entrance was so I could crawl under the deck to get it and he informed me there was no access.

Double argh!!

Plan B was to crowbar up a board and frantically scrabble for it. My fingers JUST reached it, narrowly avoiding a major crisis, and DD nailed the board down again.

Yesterday was uneventful until my tired, cranky teenagers returned from a weekend away to see my ex’s extended family.

They grumbled at me briefly then took themselves straight off to bed.

A totally mad whirl commences today that will see me out of home almost every night until November 27.

Blimey! Hold onto your hats!

Song of the day: Cyndi Lauper “Girls just wanna have fun”