I’m planning on adding to the list of topics that I have been (occasionally) entering here. There are a lot of new ideas and different habits bubbling to the surface of my life right now – maybe it’s my version of a mid-life crisis. However most of these appear to be changes and modifications for the “better” – not running of with the secretary or blowing the kids’ college money on a Porsche.

I am now essentially vegetarian, heading to the vegan side of the spectrum, I am on buses and metro as often as possible, I am becoming involved in a civic activist group trying to improve community input into planning and land use, and generally heading towards middle aged hippy-dom.

Why – and will this stick? These are two questions that I want to explore here over the next few weeks.

For lent I decided to give up beef and chicken, and fish mostly. I have been wanting to try this for a while, and these 40 days provide a logical window to experiment.

So far I have not inflicted this on Nancy or Jake, instead I have been cooking things that can have meat added at the last stage. I will be trying a few things this week though!

Longer term I think I would like to get to the point where meat is in our diet, but at a greatly reduced frequency – maybe once a week or at most. That will be better for our health, I believe, and will then allow us to actually purchase “better” meats, locally raised in sustainable situations, rather then from the concrete pens in the Midwest.

Yesterday was double birthday day in our house. Nancy turned 52, and Jake ( our youngest) moved on to 16 years. Our family is steadily transitioning to a new stage of life. That is not a bad thing, especially as we are in generally great shape to meet the new adventures.

2012 – seems like an very futuristic year – the date you might pick if you were writing science fiction in the early (19)70s and wanted a date that was not in crazy far   future, like 4278, but far enough away that you could imagine most things. And here we are and about the only thing that I think is really where it should be is the widespread use of handheld super computers ( or “phones”). The biggest positive surprise from the 1970s  might be that we haven’t turned major sections of the planet into  barren radioactive wastelands.

I wonder what this year will bring – last year certainly had some surprises, a few sad moments, and a few pleasant events. Biggest surprise for me in 2011 was my different job, which  is generally a good situation, certainly a twist from what I had been projecting for my self – which I should know not to do. The span of my control is always much smaller than I think.

Here is a link to the soup I plan to make for Christmas Eve  - Golden Harvest Soup.

Of course I will have ?to ?cha?nge the quantities somewhat.

I went up to Baltimore last night to watch our neighboring high school, Quince Orchard, play in the state 4A ( there are four classes of high school, based on overall enrollment, for the sports) football final. The game was played at the Raven’s stadium. It was a great game with QO taking a lead early and going well ahead by half time. However Old Mill came back and tied the game 28-28 with seconds to go. Old Mill won in overtime with a two-point conversion.

It was a fun evening, saw a few folks I know. It would have been a tough game to lose and I was kind of happy not to be too interested!