I AM really getting used to this retirement lark. There is something strangely comforting about waking up at my usual 6.30am, and knowing that I can stay in bed all day if the mood takes me.

There’s no longer any need to go out with the dog with eyes half closed at the crack of dawn, nettling myself repeatedly on half -grown specimens of urtica dioica, or falling over repeatedly in my haste to get back in and get washed ready for the drive to Hexham.

I can take my time now, and avoid potential conflict with other pre-work dog walkers. I can go further and take longer, to the dog’s huge delight.

She has time to plunge into the Hareshaw Burn for a swim, vainly chase rabbits and sniff every tussock of grass to her heart’s content,

I have time for a leisurely breakfast, which I mostly eat outside thanks to the agreeably mild weather, and indulge in a little light weed removal from the block paving.

It’s an idyllic existence after 49 years of working every day, but I am now finding myself looking for a hobby to pass the time between meals.

I have tracked down most of my fishing tackle but have yet to wet a line, and as a born-again cyclist, I have invested in an interesting device to keep moderately fit without actually taking to the road.

I just jack up the back wheel of my own bike onto an A-frame with roller attached, and can then pedal along for as long as I like, without the inconvenience of potholes, flies, precipitous hills, timber wagons, dopey sheep and troublesome wind.

It is rather boring I must confess to do all that pedalling without a change of scenery, but I am sure many calories are being burned off.

I have therefore being toying with the notion of taking up golf, despite the fact I have seldom had a golf club in my hands for the best part of half a century.

When I was in my early teens, I was seldom away from the pitch and putt course at one of the municipal parks in Macclesfield, when a two shilling piece could be exchanged for a seven iron and a putter, with which to hack round 18 of the most challenging holes in the entire North-West.

The holes themselves were possibly not that demanding when they were first laid out, but they did not appear to have had a penny spent on them since they were opened by some Victorian worthy in plus fours and handlebar moustache.

Several of the holes were guarded by bunkers, which may once have contained sand, but this had long since been spirited away by people with walls to build or budgies to cater for.

They were just muddy depressions, often with water hazards in the form of scummy little ponds, occasionally with resident tadpoles.

Then there were the Mossites, ruffians from the nearby council estate, who lay in wait at the extreme edge of the park ready to pounce on the unwary as they approached the ninth green.

Anyone caught could expect to be punched, have any sweets stolen from their pockets, and perhaps have their hired clubs bent round their heads.

Club interference didn’t make too much difference though, as the clubs were already pretty warped when distributed, after many years of cruel abuse.

The head once came off my putter when I gently whacked it into the turf following a missed two foot putt, but I stuck it back on with a piece of Bazooka Joe bubble gum, and hoped the parkie wouldn’t notice.

I still don’t know whether he noticed, but the putter with the tell-tale pink band at the end of the shaft was still being handed out many years later.

Some 20 years later, I was invited to accompany an eight handicapper over nine holes on Tyne Green while I conducted an interview, my pathetic flailing usually only moving the ball six feet, if I made contact with it at all.

I think I had already clocked up more than 200 strokes when towards the end of the round, I somehow caught the ball perfectly, and watched in amazement as it sailed majestically through the air and came to rest some three feet from the pin.

I took three more putts to get it down from there, but if I could just recapture that moment, golf might be the retirement game for me ...