I mean [friend’s], what… five years older than me, no, [coughs] sorry… nearly six years older than me, but physically she’s fitter than I am, so although we’re five years in, she could go on for a long time yet and, you know, and there’s every possibility that she might outlive me.

I mean I… you know, I try and grab the post before she does and say, “Oh, that’s for you, that’s for you, and that’s a bill for me,” or something, or, “that’s important, I need to keep that,” you know, her tax coding and thing came the other day, and they just disappear in the house, and everything disappears. I had a red bill the other day, and I had to get in touch with them and say, “Look, I’m sorry about this, but I didn’t know the bill had come,” because she swears that she hadn’t had one, and I can’t find it because you just can’t find anything in her house’; there’s stacks of stuff everywhere.

I mean she’s even started forgetting to put the rubbish out on a Thurday night, and I remind her: by the time she’s got to the car, to the door, she’s forgotten, and if I go in earlier and say, “Oh, shall we put the rubbish out now?” “No, no, no, I’ll do that later. No, no, leave it, I’ll do it later,” which is OK most of the time because there isn’t anything really, you know, nasty there because she doesn’t cook, but there are times when I thought oh god “Let’s get this out of here,” and then she’ll put it round the side of the house, because there’s a little alleyway at the side by the back gate, and she’ll put it round there, and there’s bags there that have been there since before [friend’s husband’s name] died.

She can be very embarrassing in public, very embarrassing in public, she… all the time she’s saying to people things like “Oh, she only comes here because there’s a man here,” about me, “and she’s always after the men,” and all this sort of thing, and, “oh, you’ve done this, and you’ve done that,” and she tells them, “Oh, she always bullies me, she does this to me, and she does that,”

But it can be very embarrassing sometimes with a stranger.

On one occasion: she came out of the bedroom and she looked at my grandson who was then… he must have been just 14, and his mate that we’d taken with us, who was also 14, and she looked at them and they were on their… you know, these devices that they’re on all the time now, and she said, “I hope you’re not looking at naked girls on there,” and they said, “No, [friend’s name], we’re not,” and he… she said, “Well, if you’re looking at naked men, that’s ever worse,” and of course, there’s [daughter’s name] and I, my daughter, cringing, and I’m saying, “[friend’s name], do you want a cup of tea,” [huh] I said to the boys afterwards, I said, “I’m really sorry, she said something like that,” you know, and they said, “It’s all right, don’t worry, we understand,” you know, but, you know, she is inclined to be very inappropriate at times, [chuckles] so she just sort of forgets that you can’t do things.