I could be world champion

There are not many things I'm good at, including English grammar as that opening phrase should probably read "there are not many things at which I am good". But the "correct" wording - if, indeed, it is correct - sounds clumsy. Perhaps the best way of dealing with it is to reword it completely.

There are not many things I do well. Does that sound better? It's a bit like when I try to write a letter in French. I don't have to do it very often and my French is not exactly fluent so when the need arises I tend to draft the letter in English and then translate it. The problem with doing that is that although I usually manage to get the words right, the result is not exactly correct because the French put things in a different order. Anyway, as I was saying, there are not many things I do well but there is one sphere of activity in which I am definitely world class. I suppose the purists might say that my world-beating ability is in a sphere of inactivity rather than activity since my prowess is in procrastination. There are people, I am told although I can't recall ever meeting one of them, who live by the motto, "Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today". Not me. For me, the converse is true and I am for ever trying to find excuses for deferring things. Not that I have to try particularly hard as there is always something else more urgent or important or just more interesting that I want to get on with.

This morning is a case in point. I have a pile of paper sitting beside my keyboard on my desk. This constitutes my pending file. I don't remember when I last looked at the papers at the bottom of the pile but I have a sneaking suspicion that the very bottom one could be a letter from my dentist reminding me that my 6-monthly check up is due. That has been sitting there for 18 months now. I did nothing about it when I received it because the last time I visited my dentist he suggested that I only need see him once a year unless I have trouble. Well, I haven't had trouble so there didn't seem much point in disturbing him but I suppose I really should do so sometime. Not that that particular example demonstrates this morning's procrastination. That refers to a letter I should have written before now to a young lad in Maryland who suffers from cystic fibrosis.

Some years ago my Lions Club twinned with a club from Maryland. After a while we decided that twinning should be more than just exchanging newsletters and we decided to establish a joint service project. After some to-ing and fro-ing, it was agreed that we should each "adopt" a disabled or life-limited youngster in the other club's area and try to brighten their lives by sending letters and postcards. Somehow it has fallen to me to write to Joe each month and I diarise to do so at the beginning of the month. I have spent all week putting off writing my April letter as I am finding it increasingly difficult to write on a different theme every month. I have suggested that somebody else might take over this job - I've been doing it since its inception - but to no avail.

Well, I mustn't put it off any longer. I had better see what I wrote last month and try to carry on from there.