Well, here goes...

The last time I wrote a blog post was when I was 16. I had one of those MSN pages, and the content was largely along the lines of: “I love my puppy. School was interesting today. Going to the movies at the weekend. Wah, that cute guy from Chemistry hasn’t texted me in a while.” I can’t promise that this one will be much different; after all, I DO love my puppy (even though he’s now four and half), life is interesting, and the current cute guy actually hasn’t texted me in while either... So you were warned.

Buuut, I have found myself with less and less things to do over the past three weeks, and as I have yet to land myself a job and I want to continue to stretch my writing muscles over the summer, I figured I’d give this a try (thanks for the idea Samwise!) Worst case scenario, I end up talking to myself...

Which seems to make the apparently obligatory “A little bit about me” first post somewhat redundant, but on the off-chance that anyone out there is listening, I figured I may as well give it a go.
I am a crazy Canadian currently about to go into my third year of English & Creative Writing at the University of Portsmouth. I absolutely adore my degree, and am apparently fairly good at it as well. I want to be a published author one day, and am aiming to go into either the sitcom or publishing business when I graduate, to pay the bills. (Shameless self plug: read my fiction writing at www.fictionpress.com/~laurapatricia)

My dreams and self integrity are very important to me. The way I see it, you’re only with other people a small portion of your day, but you have to associate with yourself 100% of the time, so why be someone you don’t like? I am who I am, and I won’t change that for anyone.

I am fiercely protective of my friends, who are also very valuable to me. You know who you are, and why I love you. Mess with them, and you will have a small feisty brunette to mess with too.

I am a massive dog nerd – I don’t just love them, I love to read and learn about them, and Crufts really is the highlight of my year. If I wasn’t doing my degree I would be pursuing a career in Canine Behaviourism, and I still might if it turns out I’m a terrible writer after all! If I was breed of dog I would be some sort of terrier; no one ever told me that I’m small, I’m stubborn, tenacious, adorable, clever and loyal, and I won’t start fights, but I can finish them!

I’m also a Seth MacFarlane nerd, if such a thing exists – the man is nothing short of a genius. I know most people like Family Guy, but for me it is an (admittedly almost unhealthy) obsession. I watch the shows, I quote the shows, I listen to the commentaries, I watch the shows again. I have only recently gotten into American Dad, but I adore it almost as much – and the people there won my undying devotion when they sent me three of their screenplays!

I’m the Editor of our uni newspaper, Pugwash News, and have been involved in UPSU Media since pretty much day one down here. Little did I realise when I attended that meeting during Freshers’ week that it was going to become my ‘second degree’, provide me with some of my key university companions and eat most of my life! I love it and hate it at the same time, but it’s become a huge part of who I am down here.

I’m the middle of three sisters. Jill is the elder (technically a half sister, but we’re tight); she lives in Canada with her boyfriend and two daft cats. Claire is 18 and is going to be starting Structural & Architectural Engineering at Bath in October. She is my best friend, my quoting machine, my sanity saver and sometimes my greatest annoyance, and I cannot imagine my life without her. My parents are still together - Dad is a Geologist and Mum has an MBA and writes Offshore Training Standards. We have a family dog, who is a Norwich Terrier called Pepper. He is THE most adorable thing on the planet, and also the best behaved dog you could ever imagine. I love him. Told ya that was going to come up!

On that note I will leave blog-land for now. No doubt I’ll be back shortly with musings on the state of the job market, anecdotes about wacky friends and rants about silly boys...and much more Pepper love no doubt! Stay tuned guys, and thanks for reading! :)