About

(Edited as of June 12, 2011)

Thanks for visiting.

I am an American Telavivian, living here for 3.5 years now, and I’m a writer and I work in the Israeli wine industry (which I LOVE).  I was formerly an academic, theatre director, and PR/marketing consultant, but I’ve courageously taken the plunge away from the headache-inducing grand of the interweb.

As previously alluded to, I took one of the most serious plunges in my life and left an income and a “proper” (appearing) career in order to try to earn my bread and butter in wine.  That sounded funny, didn’t it.  I’ve been a wine steward for 2.5 years with the Golan Heights Winery, and I have been tending bar (and cooking) at an upscale wine bar in the Basel area of Tel Aviv.  Shortly, I’ll have some news, but it looks like this goal of mine has seriously come to life at the winery – I’m really excited and proud to be part of such an incredible company.

My world is a strange blend of leading wine tastings, wine training sessions, occasionally wine-bar-tending, and speed writing (on too many fronts). Vipassana Buddhist meditation used to be huge in my life, as are Iyengar and Ashtanga yoga, but it’s all too easy to stray away from these.  Still, they are very important to me, and I thought it important to mention.  I dream of losing myself again in India, again and becoming famous for my funky freaky adolescent sci fi Asian inspired novel(s) published (1.5 completed, and a handful of stories).

While I’ve lived and studied in London, Dublin, Moscow, Bangkok, and Paris, I hail from the grand city of Chicago.  I do miss Europe terribly.  I spend far too much time on the internet, and I sometimes wish I could loaf all day long reading novels (a desire to which I occasionally succumb).  A serious guilty pleasure (not that guilty, actually) is science fiction, and I have a penchant for Connie Willis‘s novels and Star Trek TNG & Voyager.  I adore Scrabble, the New York Times crossword puzzle, space exploration, experimental physics, world travel on a shoestring, and extremely bizarre foods.

I have changed my career more often than I like to admit, but on the plus side, it has left me with in-depth knowledge of several esoteric areas, including theatre directing, playwriting, contemporary art, wines and wineries, public radio journalism, single malt Scotches, chocolate cakes, opera, the cosmetology training industry, Anglo-Irish drama and literature, museums,  internet start-ups, venture capital, competitive speed carrot and potato peeling, the self-help industry, restaurant kitchens, the complete dramatic works of Samuel Beckett, and the art of international adventure travel.

Please contact me if you’d like: irenesharonhodes [at] gmail [dot] com.  It’s quite likely I’ll respond.