Laura is originally from a valley a bit north of Oslo, but has lived a nomadic life until she inherited Moxie’s Café from her grand-aunt Constance Aulalie "Moxie" Simensbraathen Sigvatson, who after a short stay in the US moved to Oslo to try her luck just as the 19th century turned tuned into the 20th. Laura has also been a tour guide in India and Sumatra, spa director by the Black Sea, a glacier guide in the Austrian Alps, cafeteria manager at a mental institution and she has driven a pirate taxi in Istanbul.
Laura is unmarried and has a healthy scepticism for strong binding relationships, but don’t let this mislead you into thinking that she is without male acquaintances of the intimate sort. She is very well read, collect art deco furniture and objects, can handle most types of tools with great expertise and is many times national champion in the Pistol Silhouette Competitions.
Laura lives on a farm on the country side surrounding Oslo and drives to and from Moxie’s in a Land Rover Series 1 1952 model she has restored herself. She has a black belt in karate, composing haiku poems in her spare time, speaks four languages fluently and can make herself well understood in a couple more.
Before the house ghost made her appearance Moxie’s was a quiet, bourgeois west end café that Laura basically thought was dead boring. It was not long before she began to appreciate both the ghost and even the strange new regular patrons and suppliers the ghost had brought.
Laura is a figure that has followed me for many years, used in single frame jokes and illustrations for many a purpose. She has appeared in many disguises and when I began planning the Moxie’s series I immediately thought of her. The technic I have always used drawing her laid the basic for the technic used in the whole series project. I’m fond of Laura, so she has been given a lot more agreeable personality than most other figures in the series – Ted
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