Abstinence: Lent Resolutions.

Every Lent a small number of deeply devoted Christians abstain from their vices for 40 days in admiration of Jesus’ abstinence in the desert. It’s a beautiful and sacred ritual.

At the same time, heathens everywhere give up their bad habits, using this time as an excuse to complain about the fourteen hours they’ve already gone without a single Starbucks before breaking their fast brutally in a Nescafe-fuelled binge which leaves them jittery for four days during which they do not sleep at all and instead read the entirety of ‘War and Peace’ curled up in a corner of their room, speaking to no one and with the curtains closed.

So, after that brief but lovely interlude, lets see what Tab readers are giving up in this most holy of times:

A close friend of mine decided to give up ‘drinking, except on organised occasions.’ When I questioned her further I was told that yes, a properly orchestrated ‘Ring of Fire’ was such an ‘organised occasion’. Whether yelling ‘down it fresher!!’ counts has yet to be established.

One boy has decided to revoke wanking for Lent. While every female reading this thinks 1) ewww and 2) that the willpower needed is nowhere near that required to put down the Dairy Milk, I would just like to point out the difficulty of policing such a resolution. Since his reason for doing it is a vain hope that he might actually get laid thanks to it (quite how he reached this tenuous conclusion I have yet to establish), it can be assumed that no one will really want to check his adherence.

One of my neighbours has given up all sweets and chocolate. Hence my new habit of tying strawberry laces to her door every day. At three packs for a pound this could add up over the term, but the amusement never ceases. More so when abusive Post Its are left on my door.

One member of The Tab team is forsaking the demon drink for 40 days and 40 nights “because I am sick of waking up, checking my sentbox/the Facebook photos/my bank balance (£40 to Ballare nightclub?!) and dying a little inside. And I sense my friends are getting sick of monitoring me on nights out. I lost them all in Life last Sunday and I feel this may have been an executive decision by the group”.

Someone else says “I’m not giving up drinking altogether: that would be silly. Instead I’ve adapted the teetotal idea to one which will save me from being the Awkward Sober Girl trying desperately to join in with the flailings of the sensorily numbed. My last straw was Wednesday. We had a build up of drunken Amazon purchases of over £50 (actually a pair of very nice laptop speakers, but still). However, it was the morning after text saying “You tried to bottle me last night. Fail.” , where the you unfortunately refers to me, and the  victim was a good friend, which proved the final push. No longer will I drink to the point of forgetting the night before (though considering the events, that might be preferable).”

Quite an interesting one here. This musician decided to give up sex in the missionary position because her boyfriend refused to make things more interesting. So she’s forcing him too. And they say relationships are about compromise…

A lot of you are giving up the deathsticks and experiencing nicotine withdrawal right about now. While I’m fairly sure the smoking area of Cindies will still be the social hub and place-where-everything-happens we’ll see if the number of Chupa-Chups suckers there will manifestly increase over the next week.

This morally-questionable young woman told me she was giving up cheating on her boyfriend. I’m not convinced that counts, sweetie.

Interestingly enough, when I sought her boyfriend out to find out about his Lent intentions, he had decided to give up white bread. Frankly, he seems dull. No wonder she was cheating on him.

An annoying number of my Facebook friends have given up Facebook apparently. Giving up status updates would be a better one for some people. Guys, it’s not Twitter. I know that it’s started snowing and I do not care if you are eating a Muller Light. Even if it is cherry flavour.

Having thoroughly purged my college and friends, I decided that the time was ripe to speak to clubbers in the smoking area of Life. This is what they had to say.

One guy was proud to reveal he was giving up the tactical chunder, determined to prove his worth and hold his alcohol in a desperate mission to make it into the college drinking society. At least he has ambition.

Despite this girl’s obvious distaste at my suggestion she gives up dressing like a whore (said more subtly than that. Slightly anyway) she definitely disproved the blonde bimbo stereotype by telling me she was giving up men. Because they just don’t know how to treat her right. All she wants is someone to love her. All I wanted was less of a cliché (should’ve seen the tits), but life’s a bitch at times.

Smart Alec in a red T-shirt says he’s giving up supervisions. Hilarious.

Brunette in a black mini is staying away from the shots bar, saying it tastes rancid and that’s always the last part of the night she remembers. She says the friend she is obviously supporting had originally given up drinking to the point of throwing up, but failed about twenty minutes ago. Drunk friend helpfully chirps in that she had actually given up vomiting on other people. I say ‘chirps’, it was more of a grunt to be honest, but the stain down the front of her dress suggests she’s managing to stick to her revised resolution.

A most wise and admirable student has given up pulling people in Cindies, because you always see them again and it’s really awkward, it always makes the college gossip magazine and it’s always a bad pull because you’re too drunk to co-ordinate. She seems feisty; I like her.

A less wise and admirable student has given up spitting. The rule only applies to certain bodily fluids of course, but apparently she’s doing it out of love for her boyfriend. He’s only given up (yawn) drinking, so what this says about the power dynamic in their relationship or the state of modern feminism I am as yet undecided. Someone needs to tell her she got a bad deal though.

On the same end of the stick, someone else has given up giving head. She doesn’t like it and just broke up with her boyfriend, so now there’s no one emotionally blackmailing her into doing it.

Not discovered in Life smoking area but still quite interesting is the resolution of Jon Laurence. As Lent President of the Union he says he is giving up his degree this term.

Not one to advocate abstinence, Sex@Oxbridge, blogger extraordinaire claims that rather than giving something up for Lent, everyone should start having more sex.

I think I’ll let that be the final word.