This week

Monday

To work at my part time job with a national children's charity. The project I work for is funded by the local county council and finance is only guaranteed until September 2007. There is a real possibility that they may pull the plug on us then and our short break care service to disabled children and their families will be gone. This current uncertainty instills an air of pessimism which makes the work experience less fulfilling than it was. I am sixty years old in five or six weeks time. Do I want this, should I retire?

Tuesday

Off to the hospital to see consultant about cataract operation. My logic is whilst I am fit and active maximise sight potential. So should I retire whilst having some beans if not being full of them?

Wednesday

Work. Team meeting with colleague and boss. Discuss the need for numerous measures which will allegedly make us more likely to get the county council contract in September. I am not sure I believe this.

Thursday

Day off. Morning spent replacing the bushes on the front forks of Honda C90. Half the work done by dinnertime (lunch to the middle classes). Then off to solicitors to register as founder director of Sleaford and District Citizens Advice Bureau. One of my current voluntary activities as a trustee of the bureau is processing their application to become Incorporated. Back home and finish the bushing job. Much better than work.

Find out that my Puch MS50 D moped has sold on Ebay for £102 to a man in Wales. He seems a decent bloke and pays immediately.

Friday

Refit forks and put the bike back together. Go out for a ride in the Vale of Belvoir. All much better than work.

Man from Wales confirms he will collect the Puch on Sunday.

Saturday

Stand on a corner in Newark Market Place rattling a collection tin for the Framework Housing Association. They are an extremely good concern which provides housing and support to vulnerable individuals who may in some cases be rough sleepers. Freezing cold but I met about fifteen people who I have not seen for ages and was able to engage in one of my favourite pastimes, gossip.

Went home and told the wife I will retire this year.

Immediate panic attack. Can we afford it? Social isolation beckons? My world may crumble without the structure of work. I'll be a nobody without a job. Maybe I am now!