A little while back, Kirsten Dirksen of faircompanies.com sent me an email to see if I’d be interested in taking part in an interview that would basically involve me helping her with some worm bin problems. According to her Huffington Post (where she also blogs) Bio, Kirsten is a “[t]elevision producer-turned-blogger-turned-ecogeek” and “co-founder of faircompanies.com, a news/blog/video site focused on environmental sustainability for people and the planet.” – so, needless to say, I didn’t make her wait very long for a reply.
🙂
Apart from being impressed with Kirsten’s credentials, I thought the interview sounded like a fun (and different) idea, and I was also really eager to get in some more practice on the interview front after my somewhat iffy debut on the Agroinnovations Podcast series (which can be found here: Part I, Part II). I assumed it would be fairly similar to the podcast interview – basically a conversation over Skype, recorded as an audio file – and as it turns out, I was semi-correct. Kirsten did indeed propose that we chat via Skype, and she did plan to record everything…BUT…she also informed me that it needed to be a video webcam interview!
😯
Well – long story short – I thankfully decided to put my insecurities and nervousness aside and to just go for it and see what would happen. What’s funny is that it ended up going REALLY well – we had an awesome discussion, and being able to see Kirsten while she talked (she actually still had to type quite a bit since the reception was pretty choppy) actually made it a LOT easier (not more difficult, as I had expected). Lesson learned!
I should mention right off the bat that very little of that interview is actually included in the video Kirsten created, but it’s really cool to see things on her side of the camera, and just generally see how she tied in some of the things I was saying to her own worm bin activities. We probably talked for close to half an hour, so it’s no real surprise that a lot of it had to hit the cutting room floor in order to create a 5 minute video.
Anyway – it was a lot of fun, and I’m definitely glad I stepped out of my comfort zone to take part!
Thanks again to Kirsten for inviting me to take part. Be sure to check out her worm bin video series on the faircompanies website (link near beginning of this post)!
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very cool and informing. i like it!
Oh wow! Loved learning more about the subject matter and the whole ‘techie’ thing …. hope you do more of these.
Hi Bentley—you are the KING of media! things are rockin’ here at the Ranch, so haven’t been around much…but this is so timely, as so many people tell me, “I had a bin, but it got other creatures, so I threw it out!” I am very much into the all those creatures are just “co-workers” to the worms. I do try to help them with the fruit flies and fungus gnats (too wet) and fire ants (too dry)that might get into a bin down here in Texas . Other than that, all other critters are fair game in the bin, IMO.
Happy Earth Day! I did a BIG EPA/City of Dallas event today in downtown Dallas. We’ll have a worm bin in every home in Dallas before I retire:)!
Way to go, Bentley!! I second Heather’s accolade. You definitely are the vermimedia KING!! (or should that be “vermedia”??)
Thanks everyone – I appreciate the kind words!
Heather – with all YOUR “moving and shaking”, I have little doubt you will reach your goals BEFORE you retire!
Keep up the great work – you’re an inspiration.
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Great interview. All of those fruit flies brought back memories of my infestation last winter. I’m not able to work out in the cold that much, so I had my bin, composting tub, rain water bucket and vermicomposting tea brewer inside. It all started with orange peels and grew from there. Couldn’t open doors and windows that much to let them out (and they don’t listen very well to the word OUT! LOL). Couldn’t even drink a cup of morning coffee in piece. Finally the end of winter and the elimination of those pest. Used fly paper, traps, fly swatter and got pretty good at swinging a hand towel. LOL I will probably have most everything inside again next winter, but I will definitely be prepared for anything this this time.
Thanks for the kudos, AND for sharing your funny fruit fly story, Buddy!
Certainly been there, done that myself! Have never mastered the art of hand-towel fly killing though – that’s impressive!
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