Promised Wellness

So far the blog has really just been about our trip rather than the promised "wine and wellness" angle, but I am about to change that!

Starting with: worm composting.

I got some worms set up last week so that I can start composting our food wastes. I converted an old city of Christchurch recycling bin into my new worms home and found wood and a brick for a lid, and off it went. They seem to be settling into their new home nicely, however a weeks worth of kitchen scraps has easily filled the entire bottom of the container which makes me think we need a larger container. Our new flatmate said no to me setting up an old bathtub in the yard as the new compost, so I moved on to the next best thing; old tires. Now it may not sound like a very good compost solution but there are a few really great bonus' to using tires. 1. They can be found for free. 2. They are stackable and thus are unstackable to get to the good bits of your compost heap. 3. Did I mention they could be found for free? So I had been keeping my eyes out for garages in the area where I could call and see if they have any tires that I can take off their hands, rather than them needing to dispose of them, when a miracle happened. I was driving down a desolate gravel road going to my job interview and low and behold there are a tires at the side of the road, and they are not behind barbed wire, score. So in driving home I carefully parked the car, looked around for any signs of human life and promptly stole three tires. Next step on my compost journey will be figuring out how to control the insane amounts of fruit flys that are making friends with the worms.

You can view my original attempt of supplying them with a good home on my self portrait a day site.

Onto: Finding a job in Wellness

Onto the second bit of wellness news, I had a job interview (of sorts) today with a woman who runs a holistic nutritional cooking school and I think it went really well. The trick is that due to the recession she may not exactly be able to pay me. So we have come up with a few ideas which include paying me in cooking classes and also training me on essentially everything she knows. I have told her that I just need to ensure that gas is covered (its about 60km away from where we live) as that is an expense I can't afford if I am not making money but other than that I am flexible in regards to renumeration. Especially for the next little while as I still have money that I saved back home. The opportunities to learn are amazing. I was thinking of taking a Holistic Nutritionist course and by working with her I may be able to learn most everything I need and save the expense. Just need to work out the budget for the next little while and see what is feasible for us. But I am so excited about the opportunities with her that I am beside myself.

Better go out and make a tire compost.