She's a life-nomad. Began as an engineer, veered into advertising, quit her job as copywriter two years ago to freelance. Now she writes articles for mags and short stories with endings she can't decide on, travels, races the dog and deadlines, drinks lots of tea, reads, travels, sleeps, sleeps.

She's travelled to Pondicherry, Goa – "you can't live in India and not go to Goa" – Kerala, Himachal in India, Spain, the UK and US. Next on her list are Vietnam and Latin America. She believes she has a past life somewhere there, and of course, to Ireland. (Reason #2: U2 come from there.)

She's got on buses not knowing where they were headed. Has been bulldozed by sangria and had life-questioning moments when a jeep heading up a hill decided to do a backward slide into a ravine. Been blessed by the Dalai Lama.

She likes to think of herself as a student of life. So she's always asking questions that people don't like. Is as curious about a cannibal's life as a dragonfly's mating habits.

Jack Kerouac is her hero. And she quotes him to everyone who will listen: "The only people for me are the mad ones, mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn burn burn like fabulous yellow roman candles, exploding like spiders across the stars."

"He, not being busy born
Is busy dying."
– Bob Dylan

Look to the left for links to all of Joan's BootsnAll articles.