Dallas (Texas, US), Apr. 11 : Eight years after serving as the 43rd President of the United States, George W Bush loves to lead the simple life in Dallas, Texas.

Bush almost always arrives at his Dallas office by 7:30 a. m., a few minutes before many of his employees. He works on his book with the help of a speechwriter, leaves for a late afternoon bike ride and spends his evenings reading or watching televised golf or baseball.

Neither he nor Laura like to cook, so they have relied on food brought by friends or prepared meals from EatZi''s, a local market.

Their 1.13-acre property -- valued at about 2.4 million dollars -- is cocooned by 40 acres of private land and a trout-filled lake.

Two oak trees shade the front yard. The Secret Service occupies a house next door. A barrier of orange cones, two police cruisers and four Secret Service agents who scan the perimeter with binoculars restricts entrance into the cul-de-sac. The Bushes plan to install a permanent gate outside the cul-de-sac later this year.

He spends most of his weekends with his wife Lauraat their isolated ranch in Crawford, Texas, where he likes to wake up early, roam the 1,600 acres with a chainsaw and cut new bike trails.

Most of his weekdays are spent 95 miles north, in Preston Hollow, an upper-class section of Dallas where he lived for seven years before becoming governor of Texas in 1995. He has declined to give interviews, except to discuss baseball or his book, and neighbours remain silent so as not to violate his privacy.

About once each week, Bush travels to give a speech or raise money for his 300 million dollar presidential center, but he always moves inside an insulated bubble.

On a trip to Calgary last month, he flew into town on a private jet and ate in a private room at a restaurant with three friends and the Secret Service. Eighty police officers provided extra security.

Bush works with a dozen aides from his administration, socializes with friends he has known for decades and lives in a conservative neighbourhood that voted for him -- both times -- by a ratio greater than 2 to 1.

He dismisses analysis of his presidency as premature, regrets little and refrains from engaging in the snippety back-and-forth between the Obama administration and Bush loyalists such as Karl Rove and Dick Cheney.

Bush feels content with his presidency, friends said. Now he will try to explain his two terms by writing a book and building a presidential center at Dallas''s Southern Methodist University, so that history will have the means to judge him fairly. (ANI)