After years of infertility tests, the best decision we ever made was to adopt, and in 1987, we were bestowed a three-month-old baby girl from an island off the south coast of Korea called Cheju Island.
My first trip to Japan, in 1998, began with an enormous crowd of Japanese paparazzi and television crews, all waiting for me to clear customs in Tokyo (a first-time experience for this wine critic). Over the next five days, the attention never waned.
The premise of Nossiter in 'Mondovino' would have been a lot more accurate when I started writing about wine in 1978 than when the movie was made in 2003. When I started, I was enormously critical of California wines, and I thought the entire wine industry was on a real slippery slope.
There is nothing in the world like the extraordinary Shiraz and Grenache wines from South Australia. While the most sought-after are undeniably expensive (they're made in tiny quantities from ancient vines), they are huge, rich and concentrated, and represent some of planet Earth's most compelling wines.
These are the people who do studies that your carry-out Chinese meals are saturated in fat. I'd just like to meet them! I mean, what do they do for pleasure?
Trevisan is one of the few Paso Robles producers to recognize the potential of the region's old-vine Zinfandel, which he blends with Syrah and Mourvedre and labels with fanciful names such as Problem Child, the Outsider and Cherry Red.
When I started in 1978, the greatest wine in Spain, Vega Sicilia, wasn't even imported to the United States. The alleged greatest Australian wine, Penfolds Grange, wasn't imported to the United States. There were no by-the-glass programs. Sommeliers were intimidating.
When somebody wants to write an article attacking a scoring system or the influence of wine writers, who's right in the cross hairs? It's not Steve Tanzer, it's not Marvin Shanken, it's me. These other people, it's not like they don't have some influence, and I'm more than happy to share it.
There is no question that Australia's most dramatic assault on the world market has been with its value wines. These are generally not from specific appellations but blends made by huge enterprises like Penfolds, Rosemount or Casella Estate - the group behind Yellow Tail.
Although the French appellation system has its roots in the 1923 system created in Chateauneuf-du-Pape by Baron Le Roy, proprietor of the renowned Chateau Fortia, Chateauneuf-du-Pape never developed a reputation for quality or achieved the prestige enjoyed by such regions as Burgundy and Bordeaux.
It may seem hard to believe - unless you sit down and taste them - but some of the world's greatest sweet wines are made in the Rutherglen region of Victoria, Australia.
What happens is that the people who are leaders in any field are copied. I mean, there's a reason why every wine newsletter tends to look like mine. They see someone who's been successful, so they sort of copy these same ideas.
No scoring system is perfect, but a system that provides for flexibility in scores, if applied by the same taster without prejudice, can quantify different levels of wine quality and provide the reader with one professional's judgment.
