Saturday 14th March

A busy day preparing for tomorrow's Young Enterprise Presentation Day in The Elgiva

Friday 13th March - holding crosses

Remember the holding crosses from a few weeks ago? The first to arrived yesterday in time for Sunday’s Baptism.

Thursday 12 March - Walk

'Walk or cycle a route you would normally drive' it said: I had to go up to Church and to the Misbourne school this afternoon so I drove to the Church, and left the car there. I walked down the footpath and over the open area next to the Abbey. I crossed the Misbourne (stream) on the bridge which, according to a notice on the path is a Victorian cast-iron bridge. I tried to find pictures of this on Google tonight but without luck. I'll take my camera next time. Not only was this greener than driving, it was a very pleasant walk.

Talking of green: Brenda has given me a book ' Shades of Green' by Paul Waddington. As the title implies, it gives varying degrees of greenness for a whole range of products and activities. I've only dipped into it so far but have been fascinated by some of the entries. A few examples:

Courgettes: Deep green is no courgettes because they have little nutritional value and are normally imported. Pale green is organic courgettes from Europe in spring and autumn only.

Bicycles: Quite green is a steel bike - better than aluminium because less energy is used in manufacture and they last longer. Not even a bit green - nothing: all bikes are green.

Coffee: Deep green is fairtrade, organic, shade-grown coffee. Dark green is dandelion-root coffee - but this has no caffeine. Not even a little bit green is decaffeinated instant coffee.

I think I'll be returning to this.

Wednesday 11th March - £1.40 a day

The contrast struck me last night between 18 shirts and £1.40 a day. I don’t think I can achieve this but I’m going to try to get close and record my experience. I’ve just finished breakfast - slightly less than normal - at an estimated 75p for food. I’m not going to try to guess power costs. And, of course, this would include delivered milk at 56p a pint and some fair trade items where there is a price premium. But I also had home made jam (blackberry and apple - all home grown) on my single piece of home-made toast.

Update - Lunch

Soup (Waitrose - but not one of the expensive ones) toast with spread on one half only; water: total 28p

Update - full day

I had a cup of Earl Grey tea this afternoon and tonight Brenda did a stir fry with vegetables from the garden. The only cost was 10p for egg noodles. So I estimate the full day at £1.50. I’ve included a breakdown below. I’m going to have a glass of wine to celebrate...

Tuesday 10th March

A busy day - but I did slow down again today: I had about 2 hours between sorting out a friend’s DVD writer (successfully - just) and leaving for a Young Enterprise meeting. I resisted the temptation to zoom through some e-mails and instead read the newspaper.

I’ve also been thinking about living on £1.40 a day. I assume this is eating only: there’s no chance of total costs being as low as this. I’ll have to think more about this challenge...

Monday 9th March - chores and FGP

I think I can tick off one of last week’s suggestions: Do a chore or errand for a member of your household. I ironed 18 shirts tonight - and a tablecloth and some napkins. I also savoured the experience of walking for the newspapers this morning: it was a beautiful clear morning and I took some pictures on the way. I’ve put one as today’s picture and I’ll post the rest when I get time.

Boating

I also think I must blog this - although it’s not a lent activity. I get e-mails of navigation warnings from QHM - the Queen’s Harbour Master of Portsmouth Harbour. The entire harbour is under MoD control and all movements are authorised by QHM - I’m not sure if disobedience counts as treason. The QHM Navwarn that arrived this morning said Motor Launch "Lynx Effect" is sunk in position 50 47.045N 001 10.905W (4.5 Cables to the North of Browndown Buoy) This is in our regular sailing area. So I thought I’d Google. Firstly Lynx Effect is that aftershave - their web site shows a video of a chap walking into a lamppost while looking at a girl. I thought there’d be a good accident ad from the sinking. Then I found some more sites: apparently, the launch caught fire spectacularly while on a training course - there are some amazing pictures on the training organisation’s web site - http://www.commodore-yachting.com/?p=597. The boat was obviously a total loss but unfortunately everyone was saved.

I noticed that the fenders were still out; not the done thing - but some power boats don’t seem to know this. I then found another site which seems to be comments by the sailing community on a number of issues including this one. One was Fenders out. Vulgar bloody peasants. Another: One down, millions more to go . . .

Oh FGP? - our term for power boats of a certain type: Floating Gin Palace

Sunday 8th March - end of week 2

Last week has been difficult - as you can tell from the absence of postings since Wednesday. I’ve been looking for a real chore to do - something that is difficult or unplesant - but I haven’t succeeded yet. I’ll keep trying. Perhaps as Bishop Alan said this evening, we have everything so easy here in the home counties.

I’ve tried to take Rosie’s prompt - gratuitous kindness, but I’m not sure whether I’ve done much. I have unblocked e-mails from a friend’s son in NZ - she did say ‘consider this your best lenten deed to date !’ I also thought I’d walk round Little Hampden picking up some of the litter - but haven’t had a chance. I’ll try this coming week.

I do have lots of blessings - 3 a day is very easy: family, friends, living in a wonderful place, colleagues, good health, lots of interests, too much to do (boredom might be a relief occasionally!) I’ve bought Stephen Cottrell’s other ‘Do Nothing’ book but haven’t had a chance to open it yet... I’ll save that for after Lent.

It’s the run up to Chiltern Young Enterprise’s Presentation Day - next Sunday, in The Elgiva: if you’d like to go along to see what local students have achieved, just follow the link on the Chiltern YE web site here or in the links. I’ve been advising the Misbourne group this year. They started with the idea of a recipe book but soon dropped this in favour of an internet radio station. They’ve been on air 24hours a day since January. They relay a commercial station - legitimately - during the night but provide real broadcasting during the day. It’s all automated so they don't need to be in the studio all day (they have AS levels this year) but it all sounds very professional. The school has been very supportive, loaning them a room for a studio and providing other facilities. You can listen on their web site - http://www.chanceradio.co.uk/ - and I’m sure you’ll be surprised that this is entirely the work of a dozen 16-year-olds.

Thursday 5th March

Wednesday 4th March

Very busy day so I failed to get lunch today. I did have a good breakfast at a networking meeting and some biscuits and a banana at about 5, but I think I can claim last week’s action to skip a meal and give the money to a charity working overseas.

This week’s actions are looking difficult. Fund-raising tea break isn’t really practical - I can’t see Brenda paying for tea! Buy a coffee - in Little Hampden? Perhaps I should get out more.

Tuesday 3rd March

Great lunch with David and Maggi today: the December advice to make contact rather than just send a Christmas card was excellent. We had a long natter about all sorts of things - mainly theatrical and we’ve agreed to meet again.

We also visited the Palladio exhibition at the RA today. It was fascinating but particularly seeing many of his original drawings - hence today’s picture. Interesting that most of these are owned by the RIBA: I assume we acquired them legitimately, not like the Chinese art that’s in the news today. It also struck me that Palladio had been such an enormout influence on architecture - particularly municipal and state buildings for so many years. We walked out of the RA building into the courtyard - completely Palladian - and into Piccadilly where a new office building at number 198-202, still unoccupied, although modern, has many of the features developed by Palladio. You can see this here.

Chore charts

I found this on the web when searching for 'Lent Chores.' Perhaps we can turn the action to do a chore for someone else into an effective sharing operation.

http://www.weirdunsocializedhomeschoolers.com/2008/02/chore-charts.html

Monday 2nd March

Not much Lenten activity today. I've resisted the energy check (see Helen's comments) because I know we should fix roof insulation in the house but the rest is pretty difficult: no cavity walls in the old part (the extension we built when we moved in is well insulated). We have a complete range of windows from an original blacksmith's leaded light to double-glazed new windows. We've got secondary glazing on all the windows that aren't modern. But we do have a log-burning stove in the lounge - I think that's renewable, at least it is unless everyone starts chopping down trees for fuel.

One of the blessings of the day was the countryside: the green is just showing in the fields and catkins are out on lots of the trees.

Tomorrow we're meeting the friend I made contact with in December as a result of Stephen Cottrell's suggestion not just to write on Christmas Cards 'we must meet next year' - we have arranged to meet, and I hope we'll do so again during the year.

Lenten thoughts

End of the first week - at least I think it is: the LLLL book isn’t very clear. Anyway as Lent ends on Easter Saturday, I’m going for a short first week. This is the first year I’ve tried to do multiple things - and positive ones - rather than give something up. This approach doesn’t have the same constant reminder of the meaning of lent, but it is much more positive. I think I’ve done most of the actions suggested in the first week and have been on the lookout to find the right opportunities to do so.

The Tearfund activity for today was to Ask whether you can give a short notice or lead a prayer at church or in your home group. So I was pleased go be asked at fairly short notice to read the lesson in the family service this morning, particularly as the theme of the service was Water Aid.

Lent - Sundays?

I’ve done a little research on Lent. Wikipedia states quite clearly ‘In Western Christianity (with the exception of the Archdiocese of Milan which follows the Ambrosian Rite), Lent begins on Ash Wednesday and concludes on Holy Saturday. The six Sundays in Lent are not counted among the forty days because each Sunday represents a "mini-Easter", a celebration of Jesus' victory over sin and death’ I’ve also counted: if Lent is 40 days, the Sundays are not included: the Tearfund campaign has 46 days!

Relying on Wikipedia is not necessarily a good idea: have you heard of the obituaries of the composer Ronnie Hazlehurst who wrote the theme tunes for many TV programmes including The Two Ronnies, Reggie Perrin and Last Of The Summer Wine? Someone had put on his Wikipedia entry that he had also written Reach for S Club 7 (he hadn't, of course) This fact got into the obituaries published by The Times, The Independent, BBC News and The Stage. You can read about it here. So don’t rely on everything you read on the web.

Comments

Thank you Helen for keeping the feedback going - but were are the rest of you? In case you’ve tried and failed, here again is the short guide to help you.

Day 4 - Saturday 28 February

A question for today: does tomorrow count? Some people say that Sundays (from sunset on Saturday to sunset on Sunday) are not part of Lent.

English Language again

I must divert from Lenten thoughts: I’ve spotted another fractured use of the language. I’ve heard two politicians using the term ‘ I identify with that.’ It was used in the context of agreeing with another’s statement, but in a rather non-commital way, allowing the speaker to take a different view in the future. I’ll add this to ‘we shall go forward’ and ‘a robust response’ as apparently meaningful phrases that actually mean a lot less when analysed.