I've always been a writer. I come from a long line of them, starting with my grandmother. Sara Criss was a newspaper reporter during the Civil Rights movement, telling the world about the racial issues happening in her Mississippi town … from a tiny kitchen, outfitted with a teletype and an even smaller darkroom, located just beneath the attic stairs. Then you have my mother and my aunt – two sisters who’ve published nearly a dozen books between them, focused on historical preservation and the occasional ghost story that comes along with life down South. I feel indebted to these women for surrounding me with books and stories at an early age. I've been a full-time freelance journalist since 2007, and these days, I balance my time between New Orleans and Southeast Asia. I balance my work between writing and photography. I report most often on loud bars, stiff booze, worthy food and ... when I'm really lucky ... the entertaining people I meet along the way. I've been an annual attendee of the Travel Classics conferences for the last decade, and I'm a member of the Society of American Travel Writers. I’ve published two books on New Orleans, and I’m also the proud mother of a travel/humor blog called Buddha Drinks Fanta.