Giving Up

Well, today is Pancake Day (hurrah) and, as such, represents the final day before the Great Giving Up Marathon that is Lent.

I've always given things up - even when I was little, I smugly got off on the willpower kick :-)

So here's my list of things for this year (I find that I require strict rules like this - I'm an accountant, so it's my natural inclination to snuffle out loopholes) - please feel free to berate me (and, if necessary, beat me with blunt objects) if I seem like I might stray... The older I get, the more help I need!

I shall be giving up:
1. Chocolate
2. Sweets (yucky medical sugary lucozade sweets are obviously ok, though, because they are yucky, I generally try to avoid them anyway).
3. Bikkits (sweets ones and savouries this year, I think)
4. Cake
5. Crisps
6. Salted nuts
7. Weekday meats (this is a new one - I feel like it's a decent challenge - fish is ok though)
8. Spending unnecessary money (by this, I mean that food and drink and actual contractual/properly necessary outgoings are ok, as are replacement items for things that have run out/broken and gifts, otherwise it's a bit hard on people whose birthdays fall in Lent. Other things are OUT).

*I don't like doing this, but there are notable exceptions for my Viajante lunch on April 14th and the end of this month, when we go to see Lovely Mat at the Wild Garlic - sometimes cheating is necessary - these are the only ones*

I am a MARTYR - a Martyr to the Cause (whatever that might be) and intend to complain and be smug a lot. You've been warned!