WASHINGTON - George W. Bush has kept a low profile since leaving the White House on Jan. 20 and moving back to Texas, but we’re starting to hear some bits and pieces of what he has been up to.

For one thing, we know that President Barack Obama phoned him on Friday to tell him most of the U.S. troops that Bush put into Iraq are going to come out over the next 18 months.

“President Bush appreciated the courtesy call from President Obama regarding the administration’s plans for Iraq,” said the former president’s spokesman, Rob Saliterman.

And then we hear Laura Bush gave an interview to ABC News and talked about George thumbing things into his BlackBerry and riding his bicycle around their new Dallas neighborhood.

You’ll recall that Bush gave up email to be president because he didn’t want every idle musing to end up as a presidential document that he would have to sort through once he got his library up and running. Or something like that.

Anyway, he has been in touch with his former staffers via email, the former first lady said.

“George is on the BlackBerry to them now all the time. But, you know, it’s a very, very different life, especially for the president, who had every problem in the world on his desk one day and then an empty desk the next day,” she told ABC News.

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Photo credit: Reuters/Pool (Documents from President Bush’s White House years unloaded in Texas)