Lent.

It's Ash Wednesday, and being a Catholic (at least culturally), and also a man known to deprive himself of certain pleasures from time to time - aka the title of this blog, I have determined to do a good Lent this year!  And what, I hear you ask, would a good lent be?  Well for starters:  NO MEAT.  Forty days of veg and at times, fish.  Secondly:  NO CHOCOLATES, CRISPS, FIZZY DRINKS, PASTRIES OR SCONES.  And what about the demon drink, I hear you ask?  Well, it's not such a huge thing for me to cut out the booze anymore, but during lent I'll only allow myself to drink when staying away from home on the odd weekend (which may happen once or twice).  Lent used to be a really big deal in this country many years ago:  in olden times people would practically keep themselves on a diet of potatoes, water, homemade bread and the odd fish.  There were no marriages or any kinds of celebrations during Lent and hardly any games of any kind.  Of course, much has changed since the 19th century!  One interesting thing about life back then was that people would allow themselves to eat Goose during lent - believing somehow that geese were connected to the sea through some ancient myth, thus catagorizing them as seafood rather than fowl.  Hmmm, now where could I get a good goose....