It’s been nearly three months since I last posted.

I’d like to blame it on the fact that I’ve been busy opening the new Main Library, or that our digital camera was stolen when our house was broken into five days before Christmas, but neither is a very good excuse. I just haven’t posted. That’s it.

I’ve been thinking about Lent these last couple of days — strange, because I haven’t considered myself to be remotely Catholic, much less Christian in decades. So it isn’t about the whole sacrifice angle. I think it has more to do with the finite period of time in which one changes one’s behavior, and the chances of success that come with those fixed boundaries. I can’t see myself giving up things like ice cream, or chocolate, or candy (god forbid). What I can do, however, is give up eating out for forty days. It doesn’t mean I can’t have the things I would normally eat if I went out; it just means that I have to take the time to get the ingredients and make them at home. I’m hoping this will have several benefits — eating less, because portion sizes at home are smaller than those at a restaurant; eating less, because it takes more effort to make something at home than it does to have it brought to me; saving money for not eating out all the time. It should be an interesting experiment.