Clearly the “back in business” post in April was premature because here we are in September (what!? September!? It’s almost Christmas) with not a sign of a post in between.

So I’m cutting myself some slack. I have a life. I have a family. I have a full-time job where I use up my best words every day and then some. Maintaining a blog as well as a social media presence – I haven’t gone dark on Twitter or Instagram – takes time.

So rather than long, ambitious posts like the ones that have been stuck in my drafts for weeks and months, I think I’ll try to keep them short and sweet. Or savoury if the mood suits. A picture says a thousand words, so I’ll try to post more photos.

In the meantime, here’s a link to a feature from The West’s Travel pages that ran last month about my culinary adventures through Sydney’s Surry Hills in June when I was a guest of Destination NSW and Vivid Sydney.

A selection of images ran in the print version including this one, or a variation of this one, that I took outside the ever-popular Bourke Street Bakery.

I sat on a park bench on the other side of the road eating a chicken, sweet potato, pea and lime pickle pie out of a paper bag.

And just as I typed this, I realised, I ate a #dirtystreetpie before that hashtag was coined this month on reality series #thebachelorau after Laurina had tears and a tanty for being taken to the legendary Harry’s Cafe de Wheels!

Which is also a neat segue into partially explaining my blog absence, because I have been addicted to watching The Bachelor Australia every Wednesday and Thursday and tweeting, possibly a little over-enthusiastically.

Even though I am tweeting in Perth real-time, ie two hours behind the east coast, a selection of my tweets have ended up on news.com.au much to my colleagues’ amusement.

Anyway, must go, have some ACTUAL pies to make before the footy finishes!