Real life has been extremely hectic lately it seems. As a result, LENNDEVOURS hasn’t been all that it can be — or has been in the past — of late. But, because this blog also serves as "What is Lenn up to these days" repository as well, I thought I’d explain why I’ve been so ridiculously busy lately.

• I’ve been working on my first issue as editor of the Long Island Wine Gazette. It’s been an amazing (and stressful) learning experience already and I don’t even have all of the stories in yet. Recruiting writers…and then weeding out the lesser ones, has been interesting. And, with only so many pages and stories, I’ve had to put off a couple talented writers. The good news is that the stories and issue are really coming together. I think I’ve got an interesting mix of the usual, expected harvest-time stories along with interesting angles that you just don’t see everywhere.
• The Baby LENNDEVOURS Preparation Tour is also well underway. Last week I started (and completed) the arduous task of moving all of my wine from my former office/wine cellar down into our actual cellar so that we can get the room ready to be a nursery. Luckily, the weather has cooled just enough that the basement is perfect for wine storage. What will do I next summer when it will get up to 69 or 70 on the hot days? I don’t know yet, but that seems like forever from now at this point.
• I’m still writing my weekly columns for Dan’s Papers and Hamptons.com as well. I’ve been doing the Dan’s Papers gig for a few years now and I’ll tell you this — I never knew how difficult it would be to churn out one quality column per week, let alone two. It’s still fun though, so I keep cranking them out. I think that having both columns does take content and ideas away from LENNDEVOURS at times…and for that I do apologize.
• As I mentioned last week, I’m also helping a good friend of mine get his new magazine off the ground. At this point, it looks like I’ll be contributing a monthly food/wine column and serving as their online editor. Check out their preview issue.
• My Appellation America job as regional editor for Long Island and the Hudson Valley keeps me plenty busy as well. Along with recomending local wines when I can, trying to conduct interviews for their always-informative Q&As can be a challenge during harvest time.
• Oh and did I mention that we have a huge project going on at my day job that is sapping me of what little extra energy I do have? Unfortunately, the end date on this project is late April 2007, so there’s no end in sight.

All that said, I have been tasting and taking notes on a variety of Long Island, Finger Lakes and even Michigan wines. I just haven’t had much extra time to write up actual tasting notes to post here, or in the a case of the Michigan bottles, write up my latest 50 States. 50 Wineries. post.

In the meantime, I’ll say this — the MI rieslings I tasted were absolutely outstanding. More on that soon though.

Stick with me folks. I feel like my head is finally above water and I can start getting a lot more done on this here blog.