It happened when I was at my most vulnerable - on my way to the bathroom wearing only a pair of slippers and a harassed look.

The phone rang and when I answered it, my oldest friend (in the sense of years known rather than mileage on the clock) was on the other end.

Frantically searching for something to cover my goose pimples, I listened in a distracted way while she chattered on about how she'd soon be on her way down from Lancashire to visit me.

Visit me?

Yes, for that long weekend we'd discussed a month or so ago. Had I forgotten? Would it be inconvenient? Just say if it was . . .

Of course not, I lied, don't be so silly, you're welcome to come whenever you want to, feel free, anytime, every time.

Oh, I laid it on, probably out of guilt because yes, I'd certainly forgotten any invitation - and I was also freezing my butt off.

Then I sat in the bath nursing my misgivings, wishing there was some way of getting a reprieve for a few more weeks.

You see my friend, whom we'll call Liz because it's not her name and I don't know any other Lizs (or Elizabeths come to that), is probably - no, definitely - hard work.

She is a woman who speaks her mind, which is admirable in many ways, except for some reason not entirely unconnected with her being a teacher, I suspect, she speaks it rather loudly.

"He's nice - are you sleeping with him?" she bellowed when the husband of another friend bought us drinks in a wine bar on her last visit.

Another friend was lectured on the probable inadequacies of his diet, which she maintained had given him, and I quote, "a bloated appearance".

Yet The Mother and Liz were always close, united in criticism against yours truly, I suppose. I say 'were' because earlier this year Liz landed for a New Year visit.

We sat around the table having dinner and afterwards The Mother insisted on clearing the dishes. While she was in the kitchen rattling those pots and pans, Liz took the opportunity to dispense a few home truths.

"She's wonderful," she said affectionately, "still got all her marbles and such energy! Shame it won't last."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

Liz then described, in what she took to be a whisper, but was probably heard by my neighbours three doors down, how her own mother and two aunts had all succumbed to the blights of old age - senility, incontinence - and that The Mother would undoubtedly be stumbling down that same path in the not so distant future.

"Then," said Liz, "you really wouldn't be able to cope. She'd have to go into a home - it would be best for everyone, her included."

There was no crash of crockery from the kitchen, just an ominous silence.

Later The Mother told me that she thought Liz was becoming 'peculiar'.

It always happens, she said, to women who never marry. They become odd.

So when I told her last week that Liz was due for another visit, her reaction was, not surprisingly, hostile.

"Why do you put up with her?" she asked. "She's rude, inconsiderate, tactless . . . "

"I know, I know," I agreed. "But what can I do? After all, she is my best friend."