I love learning about new things. I have this insatiable thirst to know about things I don’t know about, which is the reason I became a journalist. I loved university because it exposed me to new people and thoughts and ideas that I’d never even imagined in my own little Jenn-bubble. And my career has thankfully furthered that.

Being a journalist is one of the greatest professions in the world because the topic matter is infinite. One day I could be writing about the latest trends in home draperies and the next minute I’m interviewing a Playboy model, or I’m dining at one of Canada’s most renowned restaurants, sipping on wine that costs around $100 a sip, and then I’m spending the night in a homeless shelter and chronicling the evening’s events.

My latest venture is writing a travel column for CraveOnline, an awesome online magazine where I have been contributing for over a year. I’m so excited about this new project – through the course of my career I’ve been lucky enough to dabble in a wide range of subject matter and found that travel writing is one of my favourites. I love learning about new hotels and forward-thinking restaurants that are popping up across the globe, exploring culinary flavours and trends, talking to travelers and hearing their stories. And having my own column in which I can intimately converse with readers is such a privilege.

So look out for it… link to follow shortly!

1- I hate being sticky. I think I’m a little OCD about it. If I pick something up at the grocery store and my fingers get sticky, it’s makes me BONKERS (which is why I carry wet-naps in my wallet… please don’t think I’m insane and stop reading my blog…)

2- Why are there people on TV and the radio who have lisps?? Jamie Oliver comes to mind – I adore him, but wouldn’t he go to speech therapy if he’s going to be talking to millions of people every day? I had a lisp when I was little – I couldn’t pronounce my S’s. I went to speech classes, endlessly reciting, “I slit a sheet, a sheet I slit, upon the slitted sheet I sit” (sometimes I slipped and said “shit”- tee hee).

3- Black lights in bathrooms scare me. My pee has an alarming radioactive-hue to it, and my reflection in a mirror, with my pasty-white skin, is literally ghastly. I’ve heard that places install black lights in their bathrooms to detract intravenous drug users because apparently you can’t see you veins under a black light, but this sounds like an urban myth to me…

4- Dear deaf neighbor next door, Please turn your TV down. When we watch the same thing it’s like I’m sitting in a stadium with the incessant echo. K’thanks.

5- The best smells in the whole wide world are: fresh bread baking and wafting out the open doors of the Portuguese bakery on St. Laurent Street, A.L. Van Houtte vanilla biscotti coffee perking, the sticky sweet tang of the Atlantic Ocean washing up on Deerfield Beach, hoards of blooming lilacs on Grandad’s tree, warm soft laundry fresh out of the dryer, and my mom’s homemade spaghetti sauce bubbling away on the stove.