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Steve Paton & Chris Jackson with their RTS awards

We got a fantastic surprise on Saturday, 12 March 2011, when the Inside Out team picked up two awards at the regional dinner at .

It's the big bash of the year for TV and media types in the North East & The Borders and it's great fun, but it was topped by my picking up the award for "Best Presenter".

I was up against some excellent and very talented competition from ITV and and of course colleagues here at the Beeb, so you can imagine just how thrilled I was to have emerged as the one whose name came out of the envelope on the night.

We don't get to give acceptance speeches - but it goes without saying that without the whole Inside Out team I wouldn't even have been in with a chance.

So a huge thanks to Jacqui, Dan, Dave, Ed, Maggie, Susan, Andrew, Andy, Ben, Robin, Jasper, Chris, Jazz, Tony B, Lee, Matt, Jane B, Steve, Phil, Tom and Sue W. I would go on to mention my mother etc but you've heard it all before...

The night was sweeter still when one of our regular cameramen Steve Paton picked up the award for "Professional Excellence: Craft Vision" - again out of a really great field of entrants. They showed a clip of his wildlife photography for The One Show and it captivated the entire hall.

came extremely close to winning "Best Current Affairs Production" according to the judges, but we were pipped at the post and live to fight another year.

I'm also delighted to mention Look North's Katie Gornall who was singled out by the judges for special distinction in the award for "Best Newcomer". You'll recognise Katie from the sports reporting she does on the regional nightly news.

So needless to say we had a great night, and I confess it might have involved a few trips to the bar.

However, the next morning it's time to think about getting back to reality - and no bad thing too. Never mind enjoying yourself - everything that's going on in Japan puts it all into its proper perspective.

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