Flipping Giving Up Things

So, today is Pancake Day (sorry Shrove Tuesday). The day set out in the Christian calendar for people to try and achieve the always funny - getting food stuck on the ceiling - by the act of cooking pancakes, covering them in a mess of sugary stuff and then sitting back and rubbing your Buddha-like belly while listening to family members burp. It’s a day when smiles and happiness, laughter and warmth are the numbers of the game.

But it’s shortly after this, usually while complaining that you shouldn’t eat that much, the grey cloud of Lent appears, complete with the question, “So, what am I going to give up for the next 40 days?”. Of course the standard jokes come out - work, sleeping, being nice to people, but then you settle on something - usually a beloved food item (for instance, my brother is giving up crisps and chocolate.) and you swear you are goign to stick to it. And I’m all about commitment this year, I’m doing Blog365 for God’s sake!

Right this year, for the next 40 days, ending on Easter Sunday, I will be giving up the following things.

1. Chocolate - it may taste good and smell good and look good and makes me feel good but it’s full of bad bad things and I have to stop. Just for a while.

2. Fizzy drinks - a glass of water or a fruit juice can quench my thirst just as well. And they don’t come with gas!

And…

3. Volunteering for everything - I am, of course, going to keep on with my current commitments but am not going to volunteer for any more if it means putting he little bit of a life I have in jeopardy. I need my beauty sleep man (mind you for the amount of beauty sleep I need I would have to be asleep all the time!)

My thinking behind the three pronged approach is if I am weak on one then I have two more things to get to the goal. One will cross the finish line!

So, go on, what, if anything are you giving up for Lent?

See - there’s a question - today I am being a comment-whore. I needs me the comment love people!