My heart is leaping with the vim and cheer of a long-deserved cup of coffee. The brisk and blue sunny day contributed its piece as well. It makes me want to do things and learn about things! It gives nerve and breath to my desires, if not my resolve.

Thus I am teeming with ambition to learn French and Greek again, properly, (while my child learns them as well,) to order those pigments and begin painting at home, to learn all about modern art and theology, to become virtuous, to order my days so that calm and beauty reign, to beat like the wings of birds that rise from the lake to the trees, to sigh like the chime that flies from a church on a breeze, to laugh like a brook as it trips and falls over stones on its way, to SING THROUGH THE NIGHT LIKE A LARK WHO IS LEARNING TO PRAY....

But what I will do today instead is finish making and packing all the food we're going to pack on the way to Florida. We ALWAYS end up going on road trips during fasts. What is the deal? I cannot think of a single time we've been able to stop and eat local barbecue or whatever. It works out okay because fasting food keeps better in the car than say, roast beef. I guess it keeps us from spending too much money, too.

The Eternal Lenten Road-Trip Menu:
Mexican bean salad
Avocados and chips

Granola and rice milk
Hummus and tapenade (new addition!)
Bread
Cucumbers and carrots
Bananas and apples and PB
Kippers et fromage pour moi et le bebe (also new!)
Komboochie woochie

My sister (in law) said something funny about vegetarians once. "They always ruin your vacation!"

I went and bought a cart full of tiny baby clothes at the thrift store. It was "Everything is 75 Cents" day and this stuff was irresistible. I will only be able to use half of it unless we just throw gender conventions to the wind. Oh well! Someone else will use it. Now I have to pick it up in the car because I could not carry it all on my walk home (there were also four pillows and a heavy skillet.) The Drive of Shame!