It's that miserable old time of year. Jesus died for us and now we must suffer along in sympathy with him by being abstemious until Easter. Eating only dry bread, drinking only black tea. We'll swear off red meat, alcohol, chocolate and cigs and purge ourselves of all the crap. Oh and you had your pancakes yesterday and used up all the eggs and sugar in the house didn't you?
So that's it for 40 days. No more you hear.
Of course - of course! - in Ireland we have a handy Lenten variation. All bets are off on St Patrick's Day to enable us to drink as much as is humanly possible. You can eat and drink all you like and gorge on those bars of Galaxy that have been looking longingly at you from the newsagents counter. Guilt free for one day!
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Now hardly anyone does a full Lenten fast these days - but a lot of people use it as an excuse to go on a diet or target one specific baddie like fags (and in Ireland that means cigarettes of course, in case I get outraged comments from abroad). School kids will give up sweets; adults will give up booze or desserts.
So what are you giving up? Everything/nothing/something in particular?
Or think it's all a load of Catholic Guilt and you're having nothing to do with it?
