It's that time of year again

[davywavy]

Well, the year has rolled around once again and tomorrow is the first day of lent. I have somehting of a tradition of giving up, well, just about everything for lent, primarily to see if I can. It started a good few years ago when I decided that giving up drink for six weeks would probably do me a considerable amount of good, and it just grew from there - every year I would add another thing to the list of things I'd give up until eventually I was giving up alcohol, chocolate, caffeine, tobacco, first-person shooters, livejournal and reading anything which isn't the Bible.

That was a difficult one, I'll tell you.

The thing about going so ascetic is that once you've done it and know you can if you want, the challenge vanishes and so I tried other things - there was my living on the dole experiment from a few years ago when I lived on £60 a week for the six weeks, just to remind myself of what it was like.

This year, I'm being indecisive. What should I do? Should I do anything? And, as we all know, the only way to decide anything in the 21st century is to put a poll on the internet. So:

[Poll #1526186]

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Give up wussing out on showing up for games.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Remove the sickly children and - hey presto! - I shall be there.

[davedevil.livejournal.com]

Your plummy accent, you should talk like a mockney for all of lent.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

I'll have you know my accent is purest Yorkshire.

[nicnac.livejournal.com]

Using a debit/credit card. Pay cash for everything.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Can I get money out of the hole in the wall with my card?

[nicnac.livejournal.com]

Yep - the aim is to hand over cold hard cash for every purchase and to see if it influences your spending habits.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

That's pretty much what I do with the great dole challenge - I take £60 out of the bank every week and that's it. No more spending money. It can be hard until you get into the discipline of it, but not so difficult after that.

[nicnac.livejournal.com]

Yeeess - but you wouldn't be limited by a set amount, the aim would be to see if your decisions change as a result of spending actual money instead of swiping a piece of plastic.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Blimey, of course they would - for starters, it'd kill my amazon habit stone dead :)

[ginasketch.livejournal.com]

I'm giving up eating healthy food and being sober.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

You're like the anti-me.

[zenicurean.livejournal.com]

Give up the selfish pursuit of virtue through abstinence.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Trust me, sonny, I don't do anything for the sake of virtue.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Where would I get any of that from? Have you seen my friends list?

[vulgarcriminal.livejournal.com]

We are a depressing lot.

[ddraiggwyrdd.livejournal.com]

Try giving up toilet paper. That should be interesting.
BTW I watched Kung Fu Panda last night and thought of you - take that any way yu like.