Each weekday morning after breakfast I solve a Sudoku puzzle. The one shown below appeared in City AM, a free newspaper distributed each morning on Monday to Friday. Tigger picks one up for me on her way to work.

Why do I solve Sudoku puzzles? Firstly because I like doing them. I have a logical mind that delights in puzzles that can be solved by logic as opposed to, say, crossword puzzles that rely on knowledge and a more general kind of cleverness.

Another reason is because I believe it helps keep my mind active and stave off the brain deterioration of old age. Or rather, I did believe that until I read an article that cast doubt on this comforting idea. Now I’m not so sure but I do the Sudoku anyway.

Having a logical mind makes me interested in mathematics. Unfortunately, I was bad at the subject in school. I had to retake the GCE O Level examination and scraped through on the second try. Yet I liked maths and tried to improve my knowledge by study from books.

One day I decided to bite the bullet and enrol for A Level evening classes. I started attending with some trepidation in view of my previous maths experience but in fact had no trouble at all. I passed the A Level exam with an A grade.

This inspired me to apply for a degree course at Birkbeck College (University of London) where you can study part-time in the evening.

While studying maths, I was also working full time as a lecturer at a polytechnic. The university course was much more demanding of time as well as effort than the A Level course and it proved impossible to cope with both the maths and my job. After one term, I regretfully left the course.

Having a logical mind is both a blessing and a curse. If a problem can be solved logically, then it’s a blessing but otherwise, it’s the opposite. Tigger is much more intuitive and often solves problems in a twinkling of an eye that leave me floundering.

An example is choosing between equally good possibilities. On a Saturday, for example, Tigger might ask “Where do you want to go today?” Happily, she has learnt not to wait for an answer as otherwise we would never start out!

Decisions are a particular bugbear of mine so it’s just as well that there is someone in my life to help me make them!