Lent for Newbies

CatholicExchange.com ^ | February 6, 2008 | Mark Shea

[rbmillerjr]

“My nutritionist (that I went to in a vain effort to stave off blood pressure medicine) recommends...”

I discovered I was diabetic recently, actually by almost not coming out of the hospital. Since then, I’ve been on a very high fresh food diet...I basically cover half my plate with vegetables, one quarter carb, and one quarter protein...and if I’m really hungry I have a huge salad to boot...I’ve lost alot of weight and my energy is much higher. I can’t county calories or I think of food all the time, but the portion method works with lots of fresh vegetables.

[Appleby]

I have never eaten much meat — when I was a child we could not afford it, so I didn’t get the taste for it — and being but an indifferent cook, I make a lot of soup in the crock pot using whatever veg are on the “Reduced For Quick Sale” counter at the local grocery. I also have a very good and simple Italian Tomato Soup recipe that qualifies as a Penintential Meal along with bread and can be made in an hour. Fortunately for my health and not for my appetite, since my intake of salt and fat had to be drastically curtailed, I can no longer sit and devour an entire Hickory Farms Summer Sausage over the course of an evening. I get one or two slices now and then for a treat. Bah.

Almsgiving ... I keep a small jar on my dresser and put in all change I pick up on the street (sometimes can be significant), the 35 cents per week I save buy buying my newspapers out of the box and not at the newsstand, and any American coins I get in change. Whenever there is a collection taken up (last week we had Lunch Money Day at work when we contributed to the Second Harvest Food Bank) whatever is in the jar goes to that collection. I have had as much as $12 to contribute sometimes.