AM I the only 50-year-old who didn't know whether to feel amused, patronised or just plain insulted by your article, Still Nifty At Fifty (May 11)?

The corollary to that headline is that it is quite amazing that anybody who is 50 or older can actually still manage to hobble to the shops, assuming that their brains are actually still functioning sufficiently for them to remember where the shops are.

The whole tone of the article lumps the average 50-year-old person with "older" citizens.

I am 52 and I don't feel old at all. In fact, when I turned 50 I started on my third major career.

Having spent the previous 30 years in the Royal Navy and then in sales with a major drinks manufacturer, I swapped completely and became a teacher in secondary education; a career which is generally recognised not to be for the faint of heart or for those who want an easy life!

I would dearly love to be able to take advantage of a "special price" in a pub at lunch, but I don't think my head teacher would be very pleased with me if I did.

As for a "beauty makeover" I rather think that my Year Ten tutor group would fall about in amusement/derision!

While I am all for events which celebrate age, surely in this day and age when anybody who is 50 still has at least 15 years of working life, or more if the Government has its way, left in them, then this festival of age should be aimed at people who have retired, not those who are too busy trying to save for that dim and distant retirement.

Peter Taylor,

Hobgate,

Holgate, York.

Updated: 11:52 Friday, May 19, 2006