By Lenn Thompson, Editor-in-Chief

It hasn't been publicized as well as you'd think (partially because people who are going — like me — haven't posted about it much) but I'm really looking forward to attending the Drink Local Wine 2010 Conference next weekend (April 24-25) in Virginia wine country.

As you know, the NYCR has long been championing the idea of drinking wine, no matter where local is for you, so conferences like this are right in our sweet spot. Rumor has it that the conference may come to New York sometime soon and you can bet that we'll be involved in the planning and programming.

For 2010, we'll be involved as well as I'm heading down and will be speaking on a panel "Social Media: How Regional Wineries Can Get the Word Out," moderated by Michael
Wangbicker DWS, CWE with Jennifer Breaux Blosser of Breaux
Vineyards and Jeff Siegel of the
Wine Curmudgeon joining me on the panel. It should make for an interesting discussion. I'm sure they invited me because they know I have strong feelings about how regional wineries could be marketing themselves better.

While I'm down there, I'll also be hanging out with members of what I like to refer to as the Virginia Wine Mafia, namely Frank Morgan, Dezel Quinlan, John Witherspoon and Brian Kirby. They've requested some New York juice — specifically some Long Island merlot, Long Island cab franc, Finger Lakes riesling and Finger Lakes ice wine. I will, of course, be granting those wishes.

I'll also be visiting some Virginia wineries on my own (or with some of these guys) before the conference kicks off. It will be fun to explore a region I know very little about.

You can definitely expect a report after I get back.