Ugh. We’re already more than half a month into the year and so far it’s been a blur. I’d forgotten that interviews were so unnerving. Yesterday I had one for a three year apprenticeship, and soon I’ll have another one for a three month course. They are both in areas I’d like to work in and I’ll say more when I know a bit more. Right now I’m like a cat on hot bricks and I can’t concentrate on a thing.
Meanwhile…
I’m trying to organise the cob workshop (although one participant has gently reminded me that I’ve not responded to emails as fast as I could, sorry about that). I need a minimum of fifteen people to make the workshop worthwhile and I’ve not got anywhere near that many yet: either I’m not reaching these people or Germans aren’t interested in cob building. Any suggestions of forums or internet addresses welcome.
The workshops are slated to be in the Very Smallholding, and as half of it requires crampons and is currently infested by feral raspberry bushes with attitude and big thorns it isn’t safe to allow access by the general public, so this week I used some nervous energy productively by tidying up. The main job for this month is re-digging a veggie bed where the owner of the land, for some reason thinking that about 100 square metres of raspberry bushes was not nearly enough, planted another trellis’ worth. Now raspberry bushes are like puppies, they look all nice and cute when they’re little but soon they grow. This one grew, and grew, went feral with the others and tried to take over the garden. And the neighbours garden. So now it is gradually being eradicated one spade full at a time with some liberal use of the Anglo-Saxon vernacular.
The other major job for the month is to get two more trailer loads of poo. I think I’ll wait until the interviews are over first.
4 comments
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January 21, 2012 at 3:12 pm
Ken B
Good Luck Andy, The last three year apprenticeship I had lasted four years. You will have better luck.
Ken
January 22, 2012 at 10:07 am
Zweiradler
Your workshop sounds like a perfect project for Transition Town groups. I think there’s one in Stuttgart, too.
Good luck for the interviews.
Nico
January 22, 2012 at 10:08 pm
PK Freiburg
Good point of Nico – and sorry that I did not think of it myself, Andy. Can you re-send your invitation eMail? I can spread it through our Transition Town mailing list in Freiburg and forward to initiatives in Hannover and Bielefeld – not quite round the corner, but who knows…
Another issue: to me the price of the course seems quite high, and from my experience with the Training for Transition- Workshop last year I remember many people interested could not afford to pay more than 100€ for the weekend – worth rethinking with Bernhard?
cheers, Andrea
January 23, 2012 at 9:03 am
Andy in Germany
Thanks for your thoughts…
Ken: Ouch, that must have been annoying. The apprenticeships here are all regulated by the state so I shouldn’t have anything like that happen, apart from anything else I’m more use to the company I’ll be working with as an employee than an apprentice.
Nico: Thanks for the support: I’m talking to someone trom TT Stuttgart at the moment so I’ll see what comes of it.
Andrea: Thanks for the information, and I can see the point about the course fees.. Unfortunately I can’t lower the fee and still keep it viable as my costs are fixed, so I may have to do a rethink with the Bernhard and people that are already interested.