2011 - One Day At A Time!: Day 116 - Tuesday, April 26th, 2011

Yer another sunny April day, and after work, I made a beeline via Al The Almera to the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Santry where I had been afforded the honour of hosting the inaugural DCU Sports Awards, incorporating the 26th Annual DCU Clubs awards, which I was MCing for the 17th time - a lot of numbers there for digestion!

After checking into my very nice room and donning a tin of fruit for the occasion, I made my way downstairs to the Redwood Suite to have a run-through of the running order with organiser Siobhan and show director Shea. Soon afterwards, some of the 200 guests started to arrive, so it was time to enjoy their company at the pre-meal wine reception. I had a great chat with Ireland and Leinster rugby legend Bernard Jackman (a Sports Science post-graduate at DCU) who very pleasingly was as interested in my association with darts as I was in his with rugby.

At 8.15pm or so, the dinner bell sounded - the meal was buffet style with relatively healthy sporty fare such as chicken stir-fry, vegetable lasagne and salad accompaniments on the bill of fare, followed by distinctly unhealthy but even more delicious banoffi pie. Soon after 9pm I took to the stage to get proceedings under way and minutes later came the opportunity to interview former World Champion boxer Bernard Dunne on stage for 10 minutes, which was a absolute joy. He had been a little worried beforehand at what I was going to ask but he relaxed very quickly when he realised that there would be no smart-arsery involved. He was brilliantly eloquent in describing his World Title win in fantastic detail and deservedly got a great reception from the crowd.

Next came the important business of announcing the winners of the various awards but despite there being over 30 recipients in all, the continuity flowed smoothly and closing comments were uttered at 10.15pm, allowing more than ample time for wine appreciation and dancefloor insanity, where the crowd enjoyed choons as diverse as AC/DC's "Thunder Struck", Whigfield's "Saturday Night", Rage Against The Machine's "Killing In The Name Of", Caspar's "Cha Cha Slide" and LMFAO's "Party Rock Anthem". The latter choon was provided by my iPhone which the DJ was able to jack in, and the crowd went shuffle wild on the floor!

Musical proceedings alas came to a halt at 2am, allowing ample time to avail of the resident bar services in order to discuss the evening's events before retiring to chambers.