I’ve Got a Kombucha Baby in My Oven!

Saturday, after attending a kombucha-making class, I rushed home to try out my new skills.

Earlier that day, I was sitting in the cozy kitchen of Jason Firth, a self-declared “kombucha nerd”, as he walked us through the basics of kombucha brewing and shared the recipe for his signature second batch brew – Lemon Blueberry Ginger.  We got to try about a dozen different flavors of kombucha that Jason made himself, ranging from spicy to sweet.  All were delicious, and by the time the samples were over, boy was I buzzing with kombucha energy!  Then, he pulled off pieces of his precious mother and sent us home with kits for making our own.

Kombucha culture (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In a couple of weeks, after letting my baby incubate in my warm, dark oven, I will be drinking my own home-brewed fizzy.

Jason explained to us that the kombucha culture is basically a symbiotic relationship between several types of bacteria and yeast.  Sounds delicious already, right? 

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“You’re Fat” and Other Friendly Advice

Hypothetical situation: you meet a girlfriend of yours for drinks every few months, and lately each time you see her, she seems to have gained a new layer of padding.  You truly love your friend, and you are worried she’s headed to frumpsville, a place you are all too familiar with yourself.  Fortunately, you think to yourself, I know just want she can do to reverse this trend.

Stop right there.

You are in this predicament because you have just enough information to be dangerous.  You dropped the pounds yourself and have set up your own good, stable, healthy routine.  And all you want to do is share your secrets with the world.  You care about this woman and can see oh so clearly as her car heads towards the cliff.

What I normally do is keep my mouth shut.  Believe me, this is HARD.  But, you know what?  Ever heard of “Not Created Here” Syndrome?  Basically, the theory states what we all inherently know – if she doesn’t come up with the idea on her own, your carefully thought out suggestions are going nowhere.

This doesn’t mean that you can’t set up a situation where she “discovers” the idea on her own. 

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30 Day Challenge COMPLETE: Part 1

30 Day Challenge: COMPLETE.

So, now that my 30 days of Bikram yoga classes is complete, I wanted to do a synopsis of the little hints I discovered about each pose that helped me improve.  These tips come from various teachers, from Bikram Choudhury’s book Bikram’s Beginning Yoga Class, and sometimes even from parts of the dialogue that I finally understood.

First, the best thing about the challenge is that with doing yoga so often, you end up improving so much faster.  If I learn to keep my hips down or redistribute the weight in my foot for a certain pose, I have seven days that week to practice it.  Also, the flexibility and strength in class improves so much faster than a typical 3-day a week approach.

Improvements and Tips

Pranayama Deep Breathing.  Tip: push your chin with your hands as you exhale and hands with your chin as you inhale.  Improvement: my elbows go up farther (I started off pretty sad and now I’m average).

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