I was doing another typical activity of the suburban semi-detached male this morning. I was clearing up the garden (with a lot of help from my wife I must add).
Gardening for me is more about hacking down redundant bushes and removing accumulated rubbish than actually planting things. Although having said that, I did take advantage of an online discount to receive two small palm trees last week and managed to plant them in the rain. They did not fall over in the windy days that followed either, which suggests I am not entirely clueless when it comes to this sort of thing.
We were so happy with what we had achieved this morning that I paid for a Chinese takeaway for lunch, and then snoozed through the second half of the Saturday lunchtime game on BTSport between Arsenal and Liverpool.
Isn't that what retired people do? If I eat a heavy lunch these days I am easily nodding off whether I am in a comfortable armchair or not. This is another sign of my bodily age I suppose, although friends and family continue to compliment me on my youthful looks. If they could feel my aches and pains they would put me closer to my real age, I can assure them.
I had a phone call from Liberal Democrat HQ yesterday asking me to go leafletting in Hornsey and Wood Green. I told the man calling that with arthritis in both knees my leafletting days were over and he sympathised. (This was not quite true because I completed a round in Harrow a couple of months back, because it was guaranteed to be on the flat, but even then my knees almost seized up.)
My afternoon reverie was interrupted by the rattle of some post through the door. Opening the envelope I was delighted to discover my Senior Railcard which had been dispatched within 24 hours of my online application. They must have processed it on Good Friday, so it is pleasing to note that not all public institutions close down on a Bank Holiday.
It was with some glee that I had applied for this and for my Over-60s Freedom Pass for London travel. I have been looking forward to receiving some benefits from getting older after having paid my taxes for 38 years and having made few claims on public services in that time.
I now understand why people in my new age group will put up a fight to stop these giveaways being withdrawn in the future. I have already become conscious that football clubs vary in their definition of senior citizens in their pricing of match tickets, which is why I am hopeful that Coventry City do not decide to change their determination that 60 is the trigger point, at least until after I have bought next year's season ticket.
All this age-related behaviour suggests I am conforming to a stereo-type that in my former years I wanted to avoid becoming. I was a non-conformist, an individual who did not follow the herd. So what is happening to me? Are the values of semi-detached suburbia creeping up on me already?
This is why I must repeat my mantra three times before sleeping every night. "I am not content. I am not content. I am not content..."
