Decline and falls

Today's misfortune is that Dad's glasses are broken. A Nigerian agency carer points out to me that the arm has snapped off and has been repaired with sellotape. 'You need to get a spare so that these can be mended,' she tells me. I explain to her that actually, I look to the care home to sort this out - along with the lost dentures and the shrunken woollens. Two months after presenting a stack of receipts, I'm still no closer to being reimbursed for all the clothes I've had to replace. The term 'care home' is starting to grate - 'careless home' is a better description.

Of course, no-one knows how the glasses were broken. 'He probably sat on them,' she tells me. 'He was very upset when he found out they were broken,' she adds. Yes, I can imagine he was.

Dad enjoys a couple of large whiskeys while I drink a beer and tell him about my week. The home is like the Marie Celeste these days. Though I'm sure that Dad prefers having the place to himself.

The carers bring his tea and place it on a table in front of him. Pea soup, sandwiches, a piece of grilled chicken and a cup of tea. Dad bends over the soup, but two thirds of every spoonful spills onto his trousers, the chair and carpet. I go in search of a napkin, but by the time I return, Dad is covered in green soup.

I leave Dad watching the news, waiting for Strictly Come Dancing, with yet another problem to sort out.

I contact a leading elderly healthcare specialist, having read an interesting article in the Telegraph newspaper. A brief conversation persuades me that I should be more assertive in taking control of Dad's healthcare, because I am really not happy that anyone is joining up the dots.

So I call the care home to ask for the name of his key healthcare worker. They have no idea what I am talking about and can only give me the name of his key worker at the home, who is another person I have never met and whose name I don't recognise. (What exactly do these key workers do, if they don't ever contact the next of kin?)

I get the name of Dad's GP, which is the local surgery. I call the surgery around a dozen times throughout the morning without success. Eventually I get through to a receptionist, who sounds as surprised as I am to be speaking to a real person, rather than, in my case, listening to a recorded voice. The Doctor is out at lunch. I ask him to call me back to discuss my Dad's healthcare.

By 5pm, he has not phoned. So I call again and I'm told that it's been 'very hectic' and the Doctor has yet to start his calls. This is going to be another long haul I can tell.

Dad has had a tiring day. He travelled all the way up to Manchester, although only in his imagination and deluded memory. He was just about to find out 'who was around', he tells me, when I walked through the door. 'How did you find me?' he asks in wonder. 'I knew you would be here.' I tell him. 'Incredible,' he says. He sits blinking at me for a moment, then says, 'and where is here, exactly?' I remind him of the name of the care home and the village. 'Isn't that where you live?' he asks. I tell him that it's very near.

Dad doesn't want to sit in the main lounge. The TV is on very loud as always and he points behind him with his thumb to indicate Edna, who sits on a nearby couch, the only other person in the room. Clearly, Dad is irritated by her presence.

To my amazement, Dad reaches for his zimmer frame, pulls himself to his feet and starts to walk. It's the first time I've seen him take so much as a pace unaided in about six months. Has Dad forgotten that he can no longer walk?

I ask Dad if he needs the loo and he says, well yes that would be a good idea. I help him into the loo, put my arms around his waist, unbuckle his belt and drop his pants in rapid motion and wheel him round onto the loo seat. Mission accomplished, without accident for once.

I ask one of the carers to watch after Dad while I go to fetch his whisky. I meet B, the team leader, who looks unusually moody. My first thought is that maybe she was reprimanded for her pisspoor response when I reported to her that Dad's denture plate was missing. (I dropped her in it when I again brought it to the managers attention two days later.) On balance, though, it is probably me being paranoid and B is simply acting with her customary surliness. I have come to realised that B is a very workyshy person, all too happy to chat but reluctant ever to lift a finger to help.

I tell her about Dad walking to the bathroom and she responds with an even more remarkable story that happened while she was on the nightshift (the preferred shift for anyone who is happy not to do very much.' A few weeks ago, Dad suddenly appeared at the front desk at midnight, having got out of bed and walked the entire length of the corridor without even a zimmer frame. 'Yes,' she says, 'he can walk if he wants to. Most of them can. It's all in the head.' I point out to B that Dad's mobility is often by affected chest conditions and most recently a urinary infection. But she wants to believe that her geriatric charges are somehow trying to pull a fast one by pretending to be helpless, when in fact most are fitter than they appear. I imagine her going home to her family at night saying, 'those old people, they are just plain lazy, good-for-nothings.'

The blue lounge always adds to Dad's sense of disorientation, because he so rarely sits there. 'Where is this place?' he keeps asking me, then remembers it is a room we have drunk in before. 'We've turned this into out own little drinking club,' he says, delightedly.

Dad and I enjoy a good drink. I recount stories to him from a book I've just read about George Best and Duncan Edwards by Gordon Burn who died earlier this year. I describe the pub in Salford where George Best used to drink, which became one of Manchester's happening places simply by association. It turns out that Dad used to drink there too, although I don't remember him ever saying that he had met George Best. He did though once bring me home a signed photograph of Best, which remains one of my most treasured childhood possessions. Another time, another place.

George Best's house was no more than a mile from where we lived and I used to cycle there with my friends to watch it being built. It was unlike any house we had ever seen before, a cuboid modernist design with windows from floor to ceiling. We hoped that one day we would catch a glimpse of him but I don't think he ever spent very much time there, preferring to hang out in his favourite boozers. I remember how we marvelled at the sight of tractors digging out a swimming pool in the back garden. This was unheard of decadence to us suburban kids on our 70s raleigh racing bikes and choppers.

Dad is so happy to be drinking whisky and listening to me tell these stories. I pat his knee and feel this great outpouring of love for my old Dad with his simple pleasures and sometimes hiliarious false memories. Over the years, I've learned not to get irritated by his repetition and obsessive side. It's a case of learning to deal with what he has become. The thought occures to me that it's like the Autumn, when the leaves on the trees lose their chlorophyll and reveal colours that were always there, but never before visible.

So they did take Dad to the dentist today and the lucky man had a filling, to make the trip worthwhile. It seems like the machine, once mobilised, is impossible to stop. The dentist phoned me up at work to say that she advised there was no point in fitting Dad for a new denture plate until he has had his extractions. Hallelujah, someone who is capable of independent thought, who actually phones to consult me.

The dentist does this because she has so little faith in the ability of the care staff to retain and act on the information she provides them, such as the need to improve his dental hygiene. Of course, she was careful not to overstep the professional line in her comments, but when I described my own experiences, she was extremely sympathetic.

The unfortunate news is that the dentist informed me that Dad's hospital appointment is only for a consultation and that he will have to return on another date to have the extractions. So who knows how long Dad will have to wait for his teeth.

I get two phonecalls at work today from the care home telling me that they've arranged a dentist trip for Dad to have him fitted for a new denture plate to replace the one that they have lost. I don't know how I could have spelled it out more clearly to the team leader yesterday that there is no point doing this until after he has been to the dental hospital at the end of the month, when he is likely to have several more extractions. In spite of all my best efforts, it is clear that I am still my Dad's care manager. Dad's teeth have been missing for over a week and no-one in the care home had even noticed until I kicked up a fuss.

I'm still fuming about Dad's missing denture plate, so on the way home from work I visit the care home to follow up on my complaint. I'm not surprised to find Dad still without his teeth and no evidence that anyone has done anything to find them. When I ask at reception, no-one even knows that Dad's teeth are missing. So much for 'writing a note for the night staff', as the team leader promised to do at the weekend.

The receptionist, R, a charming Czech girl, is onto the case like a flash. She at least can see how unreasonable it is for an old man who has lost so many of his faculties now to be deprived of his dentures.

I find Dad in mid-argument with B, a young, male trainee carer. The tops of Dad's cheeks are flushed crimson as he challenges B to identify himself and explain what he is doing in the house. I immediately recognise that Dad is having one of his delusional moments and thinks he is back in his own home in Manchester.

The problem is that B does not wear a uniform, because it has not arrived yet, in spite of his having worked for several months at the care home. He hasn't even had his criminal records check come through yet, B tells me cheerily. B is also heavily tattooed and as Dad used to say, when describing my own friends way back in the punk era, looks like he has spent the night in a telephone kiosk - something which now would be a physical impossibility.

I remind Dad that we both chatted at length to B only two days ago, when he told us about his last job living in a sheltered house with three young adults, one with Downs syndrome, one with paranoid schizophrenia and one with severe autism. 'Sometimes when we were in public, they would all start laying into each other and I'd have to pretend like I didn't know them,' B told us, before saying how boring he finds this job in comparison. No wonder really.

It's too late in the day for Dad's brain to function and he keeps going on about how he can't have people living in his house that he doesn't know. 'Is he trying to escape from the authorities?' Dad keeps asking me, with a suspicious glance at B's retreating back.

A team leader arrives, one that I've never met before, to investigate the strange case of the missing teeth. R has brought it to the attention of the care home manager and this time, we are assured that not a single seat cushion will go unturned in the search for Dad's dentures.

The team leader tells me that if they can't find his teeth, they will have the dentist make another set for him. It takes me several attempts to explain that it would be best to wait until after Dad has had his extractions at the end of the month. Somehow, Dad will have to hang on until then.

It's my eldest son's thirteenth birthday and I take him to visit Dad to collect his gift - a crisp £20 note that I slip Dad for him to give to his grandson. Dad holds onto the note for several minutes, views it from every angle then hands it back to me, saying 'Happy Birthday, son.'

In some respects, this is a very touching moment. It feels like all those times when Dad used to give me a birthday present. Except for the obvious fact that today is not my birthday, and my own son is sitting next to me in a fit of giggles. Dad laughs too when I explain.

When Dad laughs, I notice he's not wearing his denture plate again. It's the third visit in a row that he's been without his teeth so I ask him where they are. Of course, Dad has no idea and can't remember when he last had them.

I search Dad's room, all the usual hiding places - in the bathroom cabinet, the pocket of his dressing gown, the sides of his armchair, down the back of the bed. It's nowhere to be found. Instead I discover another two woollen pullovers that have been shrunk to the size of dolls outfits - and I am still having an argument with the care home about why they have not compensated me for all the other ones I had to replace.

I speak to the team leader who says that she will have to 'leave a note for the night staff', which I have discovered is a coded expression meaning 'I haven't a clue and I don't want to deal with this.' I explain that I've not seen Dad's teeth for over a week. This of course makes it even more likely that the teeth are lost for good. Either someone else is wearing them or they have been thrown away, embedded in the remains of a cornish pasty. The team leader tells me that this is 'always happening'. People take their teeth out and then never see them again.

This makes me really angry. How is Dad supposed to eat without his denture plate? The only positive is that on the 30th of this month, I will be escorting him to the dental hospital where he may have up to 7-8 extractions of rotten teeth and roots, so will inevitably need a new denture plate made. But that is still several weeks away.

I know about this dental hospital visit because on this occasion, I asked the hospital to send the appointment to me, rather than the care home. So I was able to present them with the letter, tell them to arrange the transport and make sure to get him there and I will meet them at the hospital to make the necessary decisions.

I've just realised that it is now over a year since Dad entered the care home. In that time, I have lost track of how many hospital appointments he has missed due to their administrative incompetence. I couldn't believe it that last week he went to the optician again, when he has now twice been referred to the eye hospital, only to be sent back to the starting point because the care home failed to get him to his appointment or to cancel it. So what was the outcome this time? Surprisingly he has been referred to the hospital again. I really do despair sometimes.

Dad is the only resident in the lounge when my daughter and I arrive. Two agency workers pretend to work on a large pile of care plans. I ask whether they mind if I switch off the Eastenders omnibus on TV so that Dad and I can chat. Clearly they do mind, as they both skulk off moodily.

I fix Dad a whisky and I'm delighted to see that the bottle I brought him last week is two thirds empty. I like to think this means that someone is at last giving Dad a drink in the evening.

Dad seems alert and even remembers having seen a Doctor in the last few days, though he has no idea why or with what outcome. After a few minutes of chat, Dad needs the loo. I try to find someone to help, but the agency carers have disappeared, perhaps to an empty bedroom where they can watch TV in peace.

Dad seems to think he can walk the few steps to the loo, but when I put his walker in front of him, he cannot raise himself more than an inch from his chair. 'I think I need to sit down,' he says.

I go to fetch Dad's wheelchair from his bedroom. There's an unpleassant looking brown object rolling around in the seat. Thankfully it is not a shitball, but I am not pleased to see that it is a medicine tablet.

On the way back to the lounge, I meet one of the permanent carers and recruit her assistance. She is a large, loud and very jovial African woman. Once again, however, it is too late. Dad has already 'had an accident' and there is an overpowering smell of shit.

From experience, I know that sorting him out will take over half an hour, so I cut short my visit and tell him I will see him in the week. Dad apologises for 'messing things up'.

I cannot understand why so many of my visits result in Dad having an accident within twenty minutes of my arrival. Is it that the mental stimulation also gets his digestive system working? I also fail to understand what he is supposed to do if he can't get up and there are no carers around to assist him. Of course he is going to fill his pants.

For all her faults, P was the one of his carers who had the right approach in knowing his bladder and bowels better than Dad himself and who took a proactive approach to his 'toileting' requirements.

Leaving the care home, I feel sad and depressed. What a miserable life Dad has and I feel so confused about where to draw the line in my duty towards him as a son. Do I take the view that we are paying expensively for his care, so I should make sure that he is looked after properly, or should I be doing more for him, at the expense of being with my own family? I don't have an answer and just feel guilty about it all.

How it irritates me when care staff I have never met before in my life tell me about my Dad's requirements, as though I haven't worked them out for myself during the forty-five years I've been his son. Today I nearly lose it with a Greek care assistant who wants to put his arm around me and tell me that he knows all about 'my Daddy'.

I'm starting to regret choosing a room for Dad at the end of the corridor. My original thinking was that it would be more peaceful for him, with only having a neighbour on one side and less passing traffic. Unfortunately, with two external walls, it is also chillier than most of the rooms. To make it worse, his room is next to a seating area at the end of the corridor with windows on three sides. So when I notice a draught in Dad's room, I go to close the curtains and find three windows wide open. While I understand that care homes need to be well ventilated, it is completely unacceptable to put an elderly man with a chest infection next to open windows on an October evening.

I point this out to the care assistant and ask him to make sure that this doesn't happen again. He tells me that my Dad prefers it cooler and that if he has a problem, he can tell him about it. I explain to this carer that actually Dad finds it difficult to express his needs, and I am telling him, as his son, that I don't want Dad left in a draught when he already has a chesty cough. The carer tells me that 'loads of them have a cough, it's all the same, innit?' I tell the carer what I think of this comment.

On this occasion, I succeed in making my point, because when I tell the team leader, he has already heard about the story and promises that he will make sure it doesn't happen again.

I ask Dad how he is and what's been happening recently. 'Nothing much,' he replies, 'not that I can remember, anyway.' Dad is grateful for his whisky, as ever, tells me that it is 'a great consolation to him.'

I tell Dad that it's my eldest son's birthday tomorrow. Dad regrets that he hasn't bought a present and I say not to worry, because we've already seen to that. 'After all Dad, it's a job to remember your own birthday, these days, isn't it?' Dad looks at me, puzzled. I ask him if he can remember his birthday. 'That's a good question, he says, I'll have to have a think about that.' He thinks for a moment, then forgets what I have asked him. When I prompt him with the day and the month, he manages to guess his year of birth at least within the same decade, but four years out. 'Sorry, son, I'm a bit of a dead loss.' I reassure him that he is not.

It's a beautiful sunny day so my younger son and I cycle over to the care home to take Dad to the pub. Dad is delighted, but says he needs a loo visit before we go. By the time we get him to his feet, it's suddenly all too late, in more ways than one.

A course of antibiotics often plays havoc with Dad's digestive system and he's painfully embarassed at his situation. When this happens, I always think at least it proves he is still compus mentis. Imagine what it would be like to soil oneself and not feel bad about it? Fortunately, his carers, both agency staff today, do well to cope with his feelings of self-chastisement. They whisk him away for a shower and change of clothing. Half an hour later we set off to the pub.

It turns out to be one of those wonderful pub visits. Somehow, sitting with an eighty-four year old man and a ten year old boy attracts some of the nicest people in the world. We get chatting to two women, one of whom tells us about her own Dad, again an Army veteran, who died 16 years ago after three years in a care home.

She tells us an extraordinary story about how she took him to Ceylon for his 80th birthday, so that he could relive his happy experience of being in the British Army in India. But the trip ended in disaster because he had a stroke on the plane and she had a diabetic collapse. Yet he lived on several years after this unfortunate experience and she has many happy memories of his last few years. She and her Dad shared a love of fast cars and she was still able to indulge him by taking him on fast drives down country lanes in her sports car.

On the way home, I think to myself what a privilege it is for me, and what an experience for my children, to hear all this living history. Rarely do I meet anyone outside of my own age group at work or in my social life. It is only through Dad that I tap into this rich legacy of human experience.

Dad has a wonderful time, supping his half of bitter and whisky chaser. My son and I go home on a high.

My younger son and I enjoy a happy hour in the TV lounge with Dad and Edna, who has become my favourite of the other residents. We watch the 'Hairy Bikers' make a multi-layered wedding cake. The whole scene is like being on the set of 'Bread'.

It is blissfully quiet in the home. Thankfully, Glynnis has been removed by her daughter. No-one told us that she was only there for respite care. If I'd known, I might have been more tolerant of her endless terrible singing, like being trapped in an audition for Granny Z-factor. Why don't they make people like Glynnis wear a 'temporary' sticker, ideally with her departure date printed on it? It would have made the torture so much more bearable.

Somehow we get onto the subject of the War (it's never far from the conversation). Edna informs us that her husband had been in Kiel, the base of the German Baltic fleet, at the end of the War. The Germans had a plentiful supply of real coffee, unlike the British who had to make do with the terrible 'Camp' coffee substitute, made from chicory essence. Edna's husband was able to trade the coffee for a set of false teeth.

Fascinating as this sounds, Edna can't explain whether he traded teeth for coffee or coffee for teeth, or whether in fact he had traded the teeth and the coffee for something else altogether.

'I don't think we're going to get to the bottom of this,' says Dad with perfect comic timing and we all laugh, including Edna. It's marvellous that Dad is still capable of the occasional witty outburst.

On the way out, my son and I discover a pair of Budgerigars that have arrived in the reception. I don't mean that they had flown in by themselves en route to the Antipodes, but that presumably they had been delivered by a pet shop. Another marvellous idea from the new Manager to help brighten the atmosphere.

My only concern is that the the birds are suspiciously quiet. Perhaps they have been stunned into silence by the trauma of their car journey and the shock of a new environment. It would be unfortunate if the home had managed to import a pair of deaf mute budgies.

Today I buy more underpants for Dad, as requested by a carer last weekend, to replace all the ones that have mysteriously gone missing over the last few months. God knows what happens to them.

When I pop round to deliver the fresh supplies of M&S finest white y-fronts, I cannot believe how well Dad looks. He is bright, alert and, I am told, has even been walking unaided today. (Apparently they 'lost' him at one point and found him in the loo, having got there on his own.)

It is quite incredible the effect of a urinary infection on an old man, and how quickly a course of antibiotics can bring him round. Four days ago, I was mentally writing a list of people that I would be inviting to his funeral (it was a short list). Today, he looks better than I have seen him in months. The only problem is that after all the stress and trauma of the weekend, I look and feel like shit.

My visit is marred only by Glynnis, whose singalongathon has gone beyond human endurance. She enters the room singing, '"It's only me from over the sea" says Barnacle Bill the Sailor'. Glynnis won't shut up with her endless songs and won't leave us alone. For once, Dad is lucid and we can't have a conversation because of a bonkers old woman.

I suggest to one of the carers that they take Glynnis somewhere else, but they are not inclined to help. So I have to fetch Dad's wheelchair, take him to another lounge and barricade the door with furniture. Inevitably, Glynnis follows us with her zimmer frame and serenades us from the corridor with her terrible voice and terrible songs. We do our best to ignore the cacophony.

On the way out, I tell the Deputy Manager how pleased I am with Dad's recovery after the weekend. To my surprise, she has no idea about his hospital trip. Then I tell her how unhappy I am about the constant attention from Glynnis. But A misunderstands my point and thinks I am saying that Glynnis has taken a romantic interest in Dad. Of course this may be true, although it hadn't occurred to me. It's just terrible to think of Dad's peace being constantly disturbed by this poor demented woman. The Deputy Manager promises me she will 'keep an eye on them,'but given that she didn't even register Dad's hospitalisation, I have limited confidence in her assurance.

I go to check on Dad's recuperation after the trauma of yesterday's trip to A&E. As soon as I enter the lounge, Edna demands a cup of tea and a bag of crisps. I point out that she has a cup of tea in front of her already, but Edna wants a hot one. As I'm making one for myself, I'm happy to oblige, as I quite like Edna for all her nonagenarian cheekiness.

I ask one of the carers about crisps for Edna, but it turns out that they have run out and need to stock up the shop next week. I report this to Edna, who declares loudly, 'arseholes!'. A few moments later she asks me if the War is still on. I wonder if Edna is having a delusional moment or if she is making an ironic comment about the crisp shortage.

Dad looks a lot better, but before I have chance to ask how he's feeling, he announces an urgent need for the toilet. I call a helper to assist him.

While I wait for Dad to be brought back from the loo, I sit in the lounge with Edna and Glynnis. There is a 1940s black and white movie on the TV and it triggers some wartime recollections for Glynnis who launches into an impromptu singsong.

Glynnis recites a line or two of 'Kiss me goodnight sergeant major', in the style of Peter Sellars doing a mock Shakespearean soliloquy, all with her glassy gaze firmly fixed on me. It's not clear whether I'm the sole member of her audience. Edna, who may be asleep, masticates loudly with her gummy mouth. Then Glynnis sings while extending an open hand in my direction, 'If you were the only girl in the world.' About thirty seconds later, she then sings 'and I were the only boy.' 'Silly, fucking cow,' says Edna, her eyes closed and still chomping on her gums.

Undeterred, Glynnis launches into:

'I'm Henery the Eighth, I am,
I got married to the widow next door
She'd been married seven times before.
And every one was a Henery'

This is followed by a rousing chorus or two of 'My Old Man said follow the van', then 'What a rotten song, what a rotten singer too', then 'Two lovely black eyes', then 'Has anybody here seen Kelly? Kelly from the Isle of Man!'

Each song, Glynnis recites in this strange theatrical voice, with her eye contact fixed firmly on me. I smile in what I hope is a pleasant but not too encouraging manner. Edna gets into the spirit and accompanies Glynnis, half asleep, singing along in broad cockney with the occasional raspberry and expletive, her favourite being, 'up your fucking arsehole!'

After about ten minutes, I've taken all I can stand of this madness. Wiping Dad's arse would have been less painful.

I meet Dad as the carer wheels him out of the bathroom. The carer chooses this moment to ask if I can buy Dad some more underpants as he 'doesn't have any'. Dad arrived with half a suitcase of underpants. I have twice since bought packets of y-fronts at the request of carers, because they are better than boxer shorts for keeping up incontinence pads. 'What happens to them?' I ask. The carer shrugs and simply repeats that Dad has none left.

I take Dad to another lounge where two carers are sitting doing not very much. 'Can you have your meeting somewhere else?' I ask politely. They quickly vacate the room for Dad and me.

Dad looks a lot better, though overnight he has developed a very chesty cough. True to form, he has no recollection at all of his hospital visit. 'Don't you remember, Dad, I say, we spent most of yesterday in A&E? I was there with you?' 'Really,' says Dad, 'I wondered who it was.'

Dad is not comfortable and keeps reaching down inside his shirt collar. I try to help and find that his shirt has misaligned buttons and is not properly tucked in - a not uncommon occurrence. I sort out his buttons and shirt-tails at the front, but Dad is still unhappy. I get him to lean forward so that I can check whether his shirt is tucked in at the back. Then I discover that the back of his shirt and vest are stained with shit and soaking wet with piss. At this point, I flip my lid and go straight to the duty manager office.

The team leader is someone I've not met before, but he responds very well to my anger. He agrees that it's totally unacceptable for Dad to be in this condition. He instantly gets the two idlers that I turfed out of the living room to give Dad a bath, while he sits down to listen to my complaints. With someone prepared to listen, I surprise myself with how much pent-up anger I have accumulated.

I am annoyed that Dad has not had a change of clothing since yesterday when he spent the day in hospital, and while I'm on the subject I point out that neither the jumper nor the trousers that Dad is wearing belongs to him. I ask what would the care home have done if I had not been there to accompany Dad to hospital yesterday, because no-one bothered to ask me about my own plans - it was just assumed that I was taking over. I also express my extreme irritation at finding an unopened hospital appointment letter in Dad's room yesterday. What have I got to do to get them to take responsibility for his hospital appointments?

N. the team leader, convinces me that he feels as passionate as me about the need to enforce high standards in the home. He tells me what a crucial role I play in making my feelings known. While I know this guy has walked straight out of a training exercise on how to deal with irate relatives, I can't help but like his style. At least he seems to care. He's not the first person to promise me that he will take on the cause, but I want to believe that he will deliver on his promise.

On the one hand, I know that the carers are lowly paid. Yet some of them are absolutely brilliant, so why should the others get away with sloppy standards and bad attitude? There are a handful of people at the care home who I think should be given their marching orders and I have decided that I owe it to Dad to get on their case.

On Saturday morning, I return from watching my eldest son play rugby. I’m just sitting down with the paper and a cup of tea and starting to enjoy that delicious feeling of a whole weekend ahead of me with nothing much to do. Then the phone rings and one of the kids brings me the handset.

Very few people that I want to hear from ever call me on my home phone, so I’m preparing myself to speak to some salesperson from a call centre in Bangalore. But it’s M from the care home. ‘I just wanted to make you aware…’ she begins in her patient voice. Immediately my mind races ahead and waits expectantly at the fork between the usual two options a) your Dad had a fall today and b) your Dad’s cash account is running low.

The conversation continues:
‘Your Dad has some difficulty breathing today.’
‘Oh dear,’
‘ He had a very good breakfast.’
‘Yes… (thinking, “Get to the point,”, but not liking to interrupt her flow)
‘Then he sat down in the lounge.’
‘Right..’
‘And he was talking to one of the carers..’
‘OK,’
‘Then he just slumped over to one side. And he fell into a very deep asleep. We couldn’t wake him up at all, for a long time… So now the paramedics are here and they’re taking him into hospital…’

Seconds later, I’m in the car, flooring the accelerator.

When I arrive, there are two ambulances outside the care home. Dad lies on a stretcher with an oxygen mask over his face, which distorts his moans into a blood chilling sound. ‘Hi Dad,’ I say as breezily as I can. Dad moans in response. The Paramedic tells me that’s the first sign of recognition they’ve seen. He was barely conscious and his complexion was completely grey when they arrived.

Dad isn’t wearing his glasses, so I go back into the home to find them. I’m disappointed that no-one seems to be taking much interest. There’s hardly anyone about and M is too busy filling in forms. I decide not to interrupt her. Thankfully, Ernest appears at the door and fills me in briefly on what he has learned. He puts a reassuring hand on my forearm and says he will think of me and hopes everything will be alright with Dad.

The 3 mile journey to the local hospital is like off-roading through rough terrain. Dad moans loudly over every speed bump and we hit about a dozen in the first 200 yards. Then we squeeze through traffic calmers and make at least two emergency stops for cars making sudden right turns. Each time, the paramedic is thrown around the ambulance, landing in my lap and crashing into the equipment.

‘Are you in pain?’ the paramedic asks Dad repeatedly. Dad indicates that he is in great pain, but can’t exlain where the pain is. I hold onto Dad’s hand the whole journey, trying to keep him on this side of that thin divide. His hand is so cold, his fingernails are a yellow, grey colour. One side of his face seems to be drooping, like he can’t open one eye and there is no strength in his grip. I become fixated by the little blue, plastic ball in a pipe on his face mask that goes up every time he exhales. I ask myself ‘Is this it? Is this how it all ends?’ I look at Dad on the bed. He seems so worn out, those familiar features retreating into skin stretched over a skull, with thin wisps of hair attached. All I can think is that I don’t ever want my own kids to see me like this.

Within minutes of arrival in ‘A&E’, a Doctor comes to examine Dad. She is a young Asian girl, her stunning beauty marred by shocking facial acne. Dad has stopped moaning, but can hardly open his eyes. Dad scores 0 out of 10 on the Doctor’s awareness test: he doesn’t know his age, his birth date, where he is, what day it is, what year it is, can’t say what a watch is and – this one almost makes me laugh out loud, doesn’t know when the Second World War happened. I explain that Dad wouldn’t score very well on these questions at the best of times now.

The Doctor conducts a thorough examination, listens to his heart, checks his breathing, manipulates his abdomen, checks his responses and the nurse does an electro cardiogram test. Step by step, the Doctor eliminates the possible causes. All his signals are normal and I’m relieved when she says that he hasn’t had a stroke.

Still, Dad moans loudly every time she touches him, as though his body is alive with pain. But when the Doctor asks him to show where it hurts, he can only raise his hand a little. I realise that he is indicating the needle that the paramedic inserted in his wrist. When the Doctor takes a prick of blood to test his blood sugar, Dad screams as though she is trying to amputate his arm without anaesthetic. When she uses an ear gun to takes Dad’s temperature, he almost hits the ceiling.

At some stage, and it’s hard to say when, the drama starts to turn into a comedy. Even the Doctor struggles to contain a smile every time Dad jumps. The problem is that Dad doesn’t like being ‘messed with’. He has always been nervy and hypersensitive. Now he howls at the slightest touch. He has become, and there is no better description for it, like a baby. I ask the Doctor what could be causing his pain. Maybe constipation, she replies.

It’s around this time also that normal service in the NHS starts to return. The positive side of being there with Dad is that I can help to shortcut the process, because I know his medical history. The downside is that I become enlisted as an extra pair of hands.

The porter who takes Dad for his X-ray tells me that he knocks off at 3pm, leaving me to work out how to get Dad back to the ward.

The Doctor gives me a specimen bottle and says that she needs a urine sample. I don’t think that’s going to be easy, I tell her. In fact, it’s already too late as I discover when I remove Dad’s incontinence pad and find that he has pissed and shat himself. Well, I draw the line at dealing with this, but have to ask several nurses before I find one who is not ‘too busy’. ‘Can you ask one of the other nurses’ is the standard response. Had I not been there, I wonder how long he would have lain in his soiled pad?

I take on the job of making some tea and getting him to drink it. ‘I can’t hold it,’ Dad tells me repeatedly. ‘But I’m holding it,’ I tell him. Dad looks at the hand holding the cup, follows it up my arm, sees that it’s attached to my body, not his, then says ‘oh, right.’ Then a second later says, ‘It’s no good, I can’t hold onto it.’

Then Dad falls asleep and I spend the next couple of hours reading a newspaper by his bedside.

Finally, Dad gives a urine sample. The Doctor tests it and immediately diagnoses a urinary tract infection. She prescribes some antibiotics and discharges him.

As we wait for an ambulance to take us back to the care home – Dad now in a wheelchair - a party of muddy rugby players arrive, including one enormous bloke bent over with what looks like a broken arm or cracked ribs, or both.

I’m so relieved to be taking Dad back to the care home, rather than having him hospitalised, which is stressful for him as well as me. It doesn’t even bother me that the ambulance driver spends the whole journey with a mobile phone pressed to his ear, chatting to this girlfriend.

At the care home, several of the permanent carers come to see Dad in his room. They all seem genuinely delighted to see him back, which I find very touching. We fix him some sandwiches and a glass of whisky, (I made a point of checking that Doctor prescribed antibiotics that can be mixed with alcohol.) By now, Dad seems to have largely forgotten about his day’s ordeal. As I get in the car to go home, it is already dark.

Dad's dentist phones to tell me that he needs 6 broken roots and two teeth extracted. What a nightmare! She will now refer him to the hospital, as we discussed. I'm concerned about how Dad will cope with the trauma of this treatment, but she says I can take advice from the hospital dentist when we go for the appointment, (I will have to go with Dad as he is no longer capable of giving consent.) Unfortunately, one of the extractions is a front tooth, which is completely rotten.

The dentist tells me that Dad's oral hygiene is extremely bad, so I need to make sure the care staff are brushing his teeth for him properly. Apparently she gave him a new toothbrush and some little wire dental brushes when he visited her last week, (I don't say that I can't imagine how Dad will cope with these, as I find them impossible to use myself.)

I ask whether we should consider having all Dad's teeth out and a full set of dentures. The dentist is adamant that it's far better for Dad's bite to keep as many teeth as he can for as long as he can. That sounds like good advice.

Funny to think that when Dad was born, it was not uncommon for girls to have all their teeth out and dentures fitted as a 'dental dowry' - presumably to save on the cost of future treatment. I know that my Grandmother (on Dad's side) had full dentures in her thirties.

Dad sits in his pyjamas at 7pm, occasionally remembering to take a sip from the whisky I have poured him. We've fallen into our usual routine where I talk and dad reacts briefly to what I say. Then there is a pause until I can think of some new conversation. Dad can't answer any question, except by rambling until he eventually forgets what he has been asked.

At home, we have a cupboard full of wind up torches that the kids have broken by overwinding. Dad is like that now. So long as you keep winding, light shines from the torch. As soon as you stop cranking the arm, the light goes out. Too much tension in a single lifetime, too many windups. Now there's no tension left in the spring.

I ask Dad about his trip to the dentist. He says that he enjoyed it and the dentist was very charming, but he can't remember anything about it. I ask the team leader, who looks up Dad's care plan and insists that Dad last went to the dentist in July. No, I explain patiently, he went last Thursday. I know it happened, because I spoke to the dentist, the home manager and the team leader on that morning. But once again, there is no mention in Dad's care plan.

Yorkshire Bob has gone home and both Dad and Edna are missing him. The whole scene is reminscent of the ending of 'One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest', with Bob cast in the Jack Nicholson role. Bob had a life force that all the other residents lack. When I open Dad's wardrobe, I see that Bob has left him half of the bottle of whisky that I bought for him.

I try to get Dad to tell my eldest son a favourite story, about how he was arrested by the Russians in occupied Berlin at the end of the second World War and how he escaped from their detention centre. This was prompted by my son talking about his favourite Xbox 360 game Call of Duty which features the Soviet Army. Sadly, Dad can't remember the story and I'm vexed that I can't remember enough detail to make it sound exciting.

Throughout the visit, we are bothered by Gwynneth, a new resident, who searches endlessly for her missing children. She won't leave us alone. Dad says that it's difficult enough coping with your own confusion without having to deal with other people's. When Gwynneth asks me for the umpteenth time if I have seen her daughter, I succumb to a mischievous impulse and say 'she went that away' while pointing down the corridor. I instantly feel guilty. Fortunately, Gwynneth doesn't hear me.

As I'm about to leave, the team leader comes back to say she has found a dental appointment for Dad to go back for a filling at the dental surgery. Is that in addition to the extractions that he needs, I ask? The team leader furrows her brow again and retreats to the safety of her office. After a long pause, Dad says, 'Extractions? I don't like the sound of that.'

I bump into Ernest today in the local charity shop where I am scanning the second hand book shelves. I wonder if he will remember me in a different context - having previously only met while visiting my Dad in hospital or at his care home. (see The Importance of Being Ernest - http://declineandfalls.blog.co.uk/2009/09/16/the-importance-of-being-ernest-6978977/).

True to form, Ernest knows all the shop workers by name, as well as the other customer. They discuss some recent local incident about a neighbour who was trying to remove a tree that had a preservation order on it.

'Hello Ernest,' I say, as I approach the cash desk, half expecting that he won't have a clue who I am. Without a moment's hesitation, Ernest turns around, addresses me by name and asks how I am. He is delighted to see me again. This guy is incredible, he never forgets anyone or anything.

My morning newspaper says that the Tories have proposed an £8K insurance levy for people when they retire which will enable them to receive residential care for life, without having to sell their own homes to pay for it. I'm sure this so-called 'home protection scheme' is a vote winner, especially for anyone whose only retirement pension plan is to inherit from their parents.

Personally, I can't see how the sums add up. £8K currently pays for around two months of my Dad's care home fees, which he 'self pays' from his dwindling assets. I don't see how this sum can possibly be enough to insure against a lifetime of care for anyone who needs it. So for every person who spends 5 years in a care home, there would need to be 30 who die in their own home. Can this be realistic when medical science continues to keep us alive for years longer than we are able to look after ourselves?

The maths only works if can only work if moving into a care home is a last resort. At the moment, demand is low because standards are poor and it so unaffordable for the majority.

So how do you restrict demand when everyone believes they have bought entitlement to a free care home place - by allowing the standards to fall even lower? Something tells me that the £8K figure will quickly rise to a more realistic price -nearer to the cost of 1-2 years care per person, so around £40-80K. But at that price, I doubt that it's a vote winner.

Working in Dublin today, I get a call on my mobile from Dad's dentist, who is preparing for an appointment with him this afternoon. She says the hospital X-ray shows that Dad has 'a mouthful of rotten teeth'. He will need at least 5 extractions, so she wants to know whether Dad is capable of giving consent and to discuss his general health. I provide such a detailed medical history that she asks me if I'm a Doctor. I can't believe she's serious, but naturally, I'm flattered. (Next thing I'll become one of those weirdos who walks onto hospital wards with a white coat and stethoscope and starts examining people.)

The dentist asks my opinion as to whether she should perform the extractions in her surgery, or refer him to hospital. Although it means further delay, I tell her I think it's wise to chose the hospital route, because of all Dad's medical conditions. I say how much I appreciate her taking such concern over her patients. A good dentist is a rare find these days and there are so many money-grubbing rogues out there. I'm still angry about the so-called 'smile engineer' who didn't even give Dad an x-ray, but wanted to book him in for a 'double hygienist appointment.'

Poor old Dad, he won't enjoy this dental visit. I shall visit him tomorrow and see what he remembers from it.

Dad is reading the Sunday lunch menu as I arrive, a choice of roast lamb or fisherman's pie. He shares a table with Edna and Yorkshire Bob. All are intrigued by the item 'Bussells', which we assume refers to sprouts, rather than the ballet dancer.

To everyone's disappointment, when the food arrives, there are no 'Bussells' on the plates. The carer, who is African, gets confused and points to the parnsips -'Those are the Bus-sells' she says, as though she is describing some exotic dish. I try to explain what a sprout looks like, as she has never heard of one before. Eventually something connects and she says that yes, there is something that looks like that in one of the tureens. She produces a plate of brussell sprouts and everyone claps.

Dad and Edna have the same technique for eating, which involves forking large quanties of food close to their face and then gnawing off mouthfuls with their molars. I offer to help them cut up the food, which they both gratefully accept. Then I have to sort out the salt and pepper on all the tables. Most of the salt shakers are empty (some don't even have stoppers on them)and no-one has good enough eyesight to see the salt come out anyway.

Finally, everyone is happy, except for Yorkshire Bob, who complains that he has no appetite. 'The problem with this place is that there's nought to do.' 'Watch it now,' says Dad in a rare flash of wit,'or they'll find you a job.' Bob says that at home, he likes to play tennis, golf and 'go swimming in the river'. The last activity strikes all of us as an unusually ambitious pursuit for a man in his 90s. 'Is it safe for you to swim in the river', I ask. 'Oh yes,' says Bob, 'there's no crocodiles or ought like that in it.'

Bob is totally serious about the crocodiles, which leads us onto the subject of his missing finger. He lost half of fingers in an industrial accident when he was restoring bulldozers for the Australian Army after the war - Bob had been in the marines. They managed to sew some of his fingers back on, but one was completely smashed and had to be removed. 'There's no feeling in any of them now,' he says, 'just a pain that never goes away.'

We learn that Bob has lived most of his life in Australia and was only brought home recently by his daughter after his wife passed away. In spite of this, Bob has no trace of an Australian accent, while he tells us that he picked up his Yorkshire accent after living there as a boy - he's actually from the East End of London.

After lunch, Bob says that he's leaving tomorrow to go back to his daughter, as he has only been here for respite care. Bob makes a point of saying goodbye to all the ladies. 'After my wife died, there would never be another woman for me,' says Bob, 'but I'm very fond of all the ladies here. Some of them can't walk any more, but there's not a bad one amongst them.' he tells us. What an excellent example for my Dad, I think.

I say goodbye to Bob also, telling him that it's been a pleasure to meet him and that I've enjoyed chatting over lunch. 'You'll be going home for yours, now then, will you?' says Bob. 'Yes,' I say. 'Well, you look a damn sight better fed than we are.' he says, as a parting comment. I smile through gritted teeth.

So I decide to buy Yorkshire Bob the whisky and coke that he has been craving. I make a special trip to the local supermarket to get the best possible price and find a bottle of Bells on offer at £9.99 and a BOGOF (buy one get one free) deal on 6 packs of coke.

Firstly, I check with the care home manager, who says that she did speak to his daughter last week at my request. She suggests that J, the duty manager, first checks Bob's room, in case Bob's daughter has brought some whisky in for him already (as Bob himself wouldn't remember.) J reports back that there is no whisky, so I get the OK to give him my purchase. I ask J to come with me as a precaution, so that the whole transaction has official approval.

Tonight, Bob is hardly falling over himself with gratitude. He looks at the whisky, then J, then me, and I can see that he suspects a catch. I present him with the receipt to show what a good deal he's getting, but Bob, like most old folks, is completely out of touch with prices. Does he think I'm trying to rip him off? Or am I judging him too harshly - perhaps he just wasn't expecting his dreams to come true this evening.

In the end, Bob gives me the cash and J gets me to sign that I have received it, together with the original receipt. This is all in case his relatives want to know where his money has gone - even though I am doing their job for them! What a farce.

So, the first act of my planned new charity - giving whisky to an old fella - does not leave me with the warm, fuzzy feeling that I had anticipated. Actually, I feel like some kind of dope dealer. No doubt tomorrow, Bob will look on the positive side and at least now I can enjoy a drink in the lounge with Dad, without feeling guilty about Bob's enforced abstinence.

Poor Yorkshire Bob is still without whisky. In a moment of weakness, I give him a large one from Dad's whisky bottle. He weeps with gratitude. As I pour, I'm thinking this is really stupid - what if he shouldn't be allowed alcohol? Then Bob reminds me that he had his own whisky when he first moved in a few weeks ago: 'They said I could bring a bottle in with me, but I never thought about what I'd do when I'd drunk it all.'

I tell Bob to keep quiet about the drink. He asks how my Dad gets hold of it and I say I bring it in for him. 'Well if you bring it in for him, why don't you bring it in for me? I can give you the money.' Bob hasn't realised that I'm Dad's son - he thinks I'm the care home equivalent of a 'bent screw'. I tell Bob that I will speak to the manager and if she says it's OK I will get him a bottle next time I visit. 'That's right,' he says, 'don't get yourself in trouble.' Something tells me I'm already in trouble.

I find Dad asleep, on his own in the lounge. 'Dad,' I say to wake him, and he says 'yes, son' before he even opens his eyes. He wears clothes that I've never seen before. It's not uncommon to find him wearing the odd unfamiliar item, but today he looks as though he has been dressed entirely from someone else's wardrobe.

We watch the local news together but Dad can't follow it at all. Every news story about polluted rivers, traffic jams, aeroplane malfunctions gets him more concerned about my journey home. 'Dad,' I tell him, 'I'm only two miles down the road, nothing's going to happen to me.'

Then Dad looks at me pathetically, 'I don't suppose when you're going, you could take me with you?' 'You mean you want me to spring you out of jail?' I say.'Something like that, yes,' says Dad. 'Well, Dad, you know I'd like to, but I do think you're being better looked after here than you would be anywhere else.' 'I suppose you're right,' says Dad, 'I just don't know what I'm supposed to be doing.' 'That's OK Dad, I think you've done enough doing in your life, let someone else take the strain now. You concentrate on getting some rest.'

Outside the lounge, one of the care assistants exercises her vocal cords with a rousing gospel song: 'It was Calvary where they crucified my Lord...Calvary where my Jesus died for me.' I leave Dad and Bob with their whisky and confusion, head for home with that dark rain cloud over my head again, imagining that this is what visiting prisons must be like.

While chatting to Dad this evening, I get a call on my mobile confirming a job offer. It's just the news that I have been waiting to hear and I can't contain my excitement. I tell Dad all about my new job and where I will be doing it, the fact that my new office has a great location by the river etc. Dad listens with a big smile, like he is so pleased for me. Then the smile fades from his face and he says, 'I'm feeling very confused now.'

There was a time when I couldn't wait to phone my parents whenever I had some good news. Now I have an empty feeling where that desire used to live. I suppose it means that finally I have become a grown-up.

As I share a bottle of beer with Dad this evening, Yorkshire Bob asks if I can get him some whisky. He had a bottle when he came in, but then he drank it and now he's dying for some more. 'Do you have a relative who visits you?' I ask. 'Yes, my daughter, but she won't be here for weeks.' I promise Yorkshire Bob to speak to the manager on his behalf. He has money in his wallet, just no means of getting hold of the drink.

I speak to the manager and tell her that I'm happy to bring in a bottle for him if that will be easier. She promises to get onto his daughter. How can anyone leave their Dad alone in a care home without access to alcohol? Perhaps I should start a national society to prevent cruelty to parents. Involuntary abstinence would be my first campaign.

I make a claim today to the care home for all the woollens that I've had to replace since Dad moved in. When he arrived, he had so many beautiful woollen pullovers and cardigans. Now, they have all been ruined because of incompetent care staff shrinking them in the wash or putting them in hot dryers. I've had to buy him 5 new pullovers to replace those he has lost.

The picture below is of Dad's favourite sleeveless cardigan, which after the hot dryer treatment, now resembles one of Basil Brush's waistcoats. (For scale, I have compared it with one of my tops which is an XL - Dad's top was an L.)

Dad has complained so often about the food in the care home that I decide to join him at lunchtime today to see for myself.

For the first time, I meet Dad's new dining companion, Lizzie. The two share a table every mealtime, sitting opposite each other in their respective wheelchairs. Lizzie is a sweet, frail woman, who enunciates every word like an elocution exercise. My first impression is that she's absolutely all there in her cotton socks and I wonder how Dad can possibly keep up. As I'm thinking this, Lizzie turns to the wall and starts to ask some imaginary person how they are today. Dad and I exchange looks. Then Lizzie turns back to me, slightly agitated, and asks, 'oh but is your wife not staying to lunch?' I discover that Lizzie thought she was talking to my wife, as though we were a cosy little foursome.

I ask Lizzie where she used to live before the care home. Again, she becomes slightly agitated and replies 'in England'. I ask whereabouts and she replies 'in a county... in a county in Ireland... Does that sound very strange? That I'm an English lady living in a county in Ireland?' I tell her that it doesn't sound strange at all, even though I feel as though I've suddenly entered a Little Britain sketch. Clearly my questions are causing her some stress, so I start to talk instead about random subjects, for some reason telling them all about poor old Keith Floyd passing away.

Lunch when it comes is chicken and mushroom pie with a scoop of mashed potato and some boiled carrots. It looks OK, if not wonderful, though I can imagine that Keith Floyd would have been horrified. I have a taste and as I expect, it's like any other bland, institutional food. Dad complains that he's not hungry, though he eats it anyway because he's been programmed never to waste food.

One of the residents finishes her lunch and leaves the dining room. She has a pronounced stoop, but walks quite ably with her three wheel walker. As she passes another table, an elderly gent with a strong Yorkshire accent grips her hand. 'I like to get a good feel when I can,' he says, laughing loudly at his witticism. I wonder if this is an example of the 'uncouth' behaviour that Dad has been complaining about.

When I get up to leave, Dad looks so disappointed. 'He wants you to move in here,' says Lizzie. 'Yes I do want that,' Dad admits pathetically. 'I know you do Dad, but I think the kids would miss me too.' He acknowledges the truth of this remark and I leave him with a hug to finish his lunch.

Anyone arriving at the care home and seeing Ernest in action would assume he was the manager. He looks like a manager, he behaves like a manager; and if you talked to Ernest for a few moments, you’d be hugely comforted and reassured to discover he is completely aware of your loved one’s current health and individual care needs. The only problem is that Ernest is not the manager, he is in fact only a visitor.

Ernest visits every day to reassure himself that his friend is getting the care that he deserves. Over the last four years, Ernest has got to know every other resident, including my Dad, and every member of staff, including the agency care staff – no mean feat, given the size of the institution. I would be amazed if the real manager could match his achievement.

It’s possible, of course, that Ernest, as a retired gentleman, simply has a little more time on his hands. Freed from the burdens of bureaucracy, the perfidy of performance indicators, Ernest can indulge in that outdated practice of simply talking to people and listening very carefully to their response.

When I visit Dad over lunch today, I witness Ernest inform two temporary members of the care team that one of the residents is sitting all on her own in one of the smaller lounges and has not had anything to eat. What were they doing about it? It was hard to tell from their response whether they were grateful for the information or irritated by his interference. I wonder though how often a confused resident might end up missing a meal because they were not where they were expected to be.

‘I don’t want to be an inspector,’ says Ernest, when I talk to him later, ‘it’s just that I want to make sure that standards are being met.’ If there is a heaven, I expect it will be full of souls like Ernest, although something tells me he would rather be in hell, where he can help all those who are suffering.

Dad sits in his new lounge with a new lady friend, Edna, whom I met for the first time last week at the petting zoo party. She's a sweet old dear, toothless and flirtatious - an hilarious combination. Before moving to the care home, she lived very close to our house and her daughter, whom I don't know, lives almost across the road from me. Dad and Edna look like two peas in a pod and I feel as though I'm interrupting something when I ask Dad if he wants to go to the pub. But Dad is keen to go and we agree that a preemptive loo visit is a good idea.

While J takes Dad to the loo, I chat to Edna who shows me the bruises on her leg from where she fell over this morning. 'They took me to the hospital. I thought they were going to keep me in,' she says. 'But you'd rather be here though, wouldn't you?' I say. 'Well,' she replies, 'I'm not so sure.'

On the way to the pub, I refer to Dad's new friend. 'She's not a friend,' he spits venomously, 'I can't stand the woman.' 'What's wrong with her?' I ask. 'I don't know. I find her revolting.' I don't press it any further. It's unfortunate that when you can't get out of your seat, you're a captive audience for those who can.

We idle away an hour in the pub. I do all the talking and Dad responds to every question with his catchphrase, 'I can't really remember.' We end up talking about his own Dad, with whom he had a strained relationship. My Granddad, who died when I was a baby, was a professional footballer from Tyneside, a boxer and snooker player, and my Dad always felt that he was a disappointment to him because of his lack of sporting ability. It had never occurred to me before, but I ask Dad how his father became such a 'man's man', when his own Dad left home when he was very young and he was brought up in a house of women - his mother and sisters. Dad suddenly says, 'Of course, his mother shacked up with another man and I don't think they got on.' 'Really,' I say, having never heard this story before, 'when did that happen?' But Dad can't or won't remember. 'I don't want to speak ill of people who aren't here to defend themselves,' he says cryptically.

It's bizarre that I simply don't know whether Dad is unwittingly revealing long suppressed family secrets, or whether it is a false memory. I suppose I will never know.

I change the subject and ask Dad how he's getting on with his new room on the ground floor. He replies that he's doing his best to put up with it. 'Why, is there something wrong?' I ask. But Dad can't think of anything that is 'majorly wrong' and he doesn't want to talk about the minor things. Sometimes I think that Dad is only really happy when he's miserable.

Back home, I feel a black cloud of depression hanging over me, a familar after-effect of spending time with my Dad. My younger son says that he really feels sorry for Granddad, 'all he does is sit in front of the TV all day.' 'Why do you feel sorry for him,' I snap irritably, 'that's all you would do all day if we allowed you to. At least Granddad is capable of sitting upright in a chair, unlike some people who spend the whole day lying horizontally.' My son, who was only trying to be sympathetic, looks at me woundedly from beneath dark, knitted eyebrows.

This dutiful son routine is starting to get to me, I think.

I discover the ultimate executive stress aid - cuddling a baby duckling.
I arrive at the care home, stressed from work, to find Dad surrounded by farm animals from a local petting zoo. He sits in his wheelchair beside a farm pen which contains a giant sheep and a variety of goats. Nearby, there's a pen filled with the cutest piglets and another containing a shetland pony with its foal. Within minutes, I'm cuddling a duckling on my lap, while Dad strokes a rabbit (see photo). It's an unusual sort of father-son male bonding ritual, but I can recommend it entirely.

The new managerial regime at the Care Home has really started to make some marvellous improvements. I'm overwhelmed with admiration for the staff who have organised this event. They are even serving caribbean jerk chicken with rice and peas. What's more incredible, someone has located the long lost footplates for Dad's wheelchair!

I enjoy a good couple of hours at the home, chatting amiably with Dad, the staff and other residents, while cuddling the pets. It is indescribably wonderful to watch an old lady enjoy the sensual pleasure of rubbing her face against the fur of a live rabbit. Even Dad admits that he's having a great time. I go home with a warm furry feeling (not I should add, a rabbit).

The boys and I cycle over to the care home on Sunday morning. We find Dad sitting alone in the downstairs lounge in front of the TV. As I write these words, I realise what an accurate description it is. Residents in care homes don’t watch TV, they sit in front of it. Usually when I arrive, the first thing I do, if Dad is alone, is switch the TV off. If there are other residents around, I ask if they mind me turning it down. No-one has ever said, ‘no, actually I am watching it and need the volume at 99% of the maximum.’ Many residents would rather watch us instead, especially if I have the children with me.

Dad is now a ground floor resident. The lounge is much bigger and airier. Best of all, it has a French window which opens onto the garden. It reminds me of my parents’ home in Manchester, so I imagine that Dad is pleased with it.

I ask Dad how the move went. ‘It was rather an ordeal, but I’m starting to get over it,’ he tells me. I ask whether he’s made any new friends. Dad laughs dismissively at this absurd suggestion. ‘No, in fact some of the new residents are a bit grim. Very rude and crude people. Uncouth.’ ‘Oh dear, I say, in what way?’ But Dad can’t explain any further.

‘And how are your new carers?’ I ask. Dad thinks for a moment and says, ‘they’re a bit grim as well.’ I ask who his new carers are, but Dad can’t remember. Through trial and error, I establish that one of Dad’s carers is T, whom I have always liked, a very friendly and helpful Polish chap with bottle end spectacles who resembles Sid Little from ‘Little and Large’.

We tell Dad about our weekend exploits so far and he listens with pleasure. At various opportunities, I cue him up to tell the boys stories from his own life. Like how when he joined the Army during the war, he started off in a tank regiment because he thought it would be safer. Then he got inside one and had an claustrophobic panic attack. But Dad misses his cue – can’t remember anything about it. I tell the story for him, because I remember it so well. Dad doesn’t even recognise it as a story that used to apply to his life. After a while, this becomes rather sad and tedious.

Gazing out of the window, my younger son watches another ‘Granddad’ perambulating in the garden with his zimmer frame. ‘Is that one of your enemies. Granddad?’ he asks. Dad says ‘not particularly, it’s more the women. For some reason, they seem to be more objectionable.’ ‘I’m sure it’s a settling in thing, Dad,’ I say. ‘Just a case of getting used to each other.’ ‘You’re probably right,’ Dad says doubtfully.

On the way home, I tell the boys to pay careful attention to all my anecdotes, in case one day they have to remind me of them.

Two weeks ago, I was invited to a BBQ party at the care home. But every time I've asked a member of staff about it since then, no-one has known anything about it. On the morning of the event, no-one answers the phone, so I leave a series of messages asking someone to ring me back. No-one does.

It's a beautiful sunny day, so my eldest son and I cycle through the woods to the care home on the off-chance that it's still happening. We arrive to find a geriatric party in full swing. All the more able residents are outside in the sunshine and there are more visitors than I've ever seen before. The smell of cooked meat still lingers in the air, but we've missed the food. It's actually a wonderful little party and I take my hat off to the team for making it all happen, in spite of the mix-up over my invitation. My son is a big hit, with all the old ladies saying how beautiful he is. He copes with this attention remarkably well and even manages to make polite conversation.

Unfortunately, Dad is very confused by all the activity. He starts to tell me that he is staying in this place temporarily and that this party is something to do with his work, but he's not sure what he's supposed to be doing. I ask him if he enjoyed his barbecue and he says that he hasn't had anything to eat. This makes everyone around us laugh, because he has just eaten a huge plate of food. Dad becomes rather upset and agitated. Then one of the men tells me about Dad going on a care home outing to the pub last week - in itself a sign that the new manager is making some very positive changes. In a jokey fashion, he says that Dad was 'knocking it back'. By now, Dad is becoming very upset as he hates being talked about, particularly when anyone comments on his drinking.

I get talking to a charming woman whose mother has been in the care home for four years. I am surprised though when she tells me that her mother's money has now all run out and in the same week she switched to state funding, they moved her from the ground floor to the second floor. 'But that can't be right,' I say, 'I was told that the decanting was according to care needs?' The lady is certain that self funders are on the ground floor and state supported people are on the upper floors. She points out two residents who appear to have no care needs at all, yet are state funded, who are on the second floor, which is where I understood the really barmy ones went. I shall have to ask the manager whether this is true.

My new friend tells me how heartbreaking it is that her mother scrimped all her life and went on budget holidays in order to buy her home and pay for a pension. But now all the money is gone and she might as well never have bothered. She is saddened by the fact that because of her mother's immobility and incontinence, she can no longer take her anywhere, because she can't cope with her on her own. It is all life's lottery of living too long.

A friend tells me about his experience with his Mum who moved into a care home last year. In her earlier life, she had been a talented watercolour artist who had sold many paintings. So my friend was delighted when a carer told him over the phone that she had recently 'taken up painting'.

On his next visit, he found her at work on her latest masterpiece. It was a seascape with a thick blue line at the top for sky, a thick wavy blue line at the bottom for the sea and a yellow ball of sun in the corner with rays coming out of it. In the middle was a simple boat with two smiling, outsized stick people standing on it. His Mum was blissfully absorbed in her painting.

My friend is now able to see the funny side of this story, after I offered him a little encouragement.

Today is Dad's 84th birthday and we celebrate with a family lunch at our favourite riverside pub. On arrival, the weather looks changeable and we consider eating inside. But the pub has no ramps, so we ask the bar manager what arrangements they make for wheelchair users. She explains that the barstaff will carry the wheelchair up the four stone steps. This is what Dad would call an extremely 'dodgy' arrangement. We question if they are not breaking the law, but she thinks that they can get away with it because they are a very old pub.

Dad literally bites off more than he can chew while tucking into his favourite pub meal of gammon, egg and chips. 'Can you manage some of mine,' he asks, as he removes his denture plate and places it on top of his fried egg. 'Doesn't look quite so appetising now' says my wife. Yet she knows that I'm not easily put off when there's a risk of good food going to waste. 'Put that one in your blog,' she adds with a mischievous laugh.

Meanwhile, I think how fortunate that we sent the children to another table to spare Dad from their rowdy behaviour; him being a graduate of the 'seen and not heard' school of parenting. The kids would have barfed for Britain at the sight of Dad's dentures. None would have been able to look at a fried egg for the rest of their lives.

Dad is having one of his very confused days. He answers every question with 'don't know' or 'can't remember', obsesses about everything around him, worries that we will forget something. It's when he asks for the third time,'is that our cutlery?' that I feel the time has come to leave. On the way home, he echoes my children by asking repeatedly, 'are we nearly there yet?' When I say we're just round the corner, he says 'thank Christ for that, I was getting exhausted.' All from the effort of being pushed in a wheelchair.

The children, whose greatest ambition is to go on Dragon's den, invent a new concept to help council maintenance departments. It's called a 'bumpometer'. You put an old person in a wheelchair and push them along the pavement. Everytime they say 'ooh', you know there's a bump that needs fixing. Dad almost finds this funny.

At the care home, T says that they have made a birthday cake for all the residents in his unit to share at teatime. Dad receives this information impassively. He gets interested when T adds that he can have a glass of whiskey with it. 'Now you're talking,' he says.

T is a delightful South African girl, who tells us about why it is her life's vocation to look after people. I'm delighted that my children are there to hear her talk so passionately about her work. We turn to go home and my eldest son says loudly 'yeah, but don't a lot of them do it because they want the old people to make out their wills to them?'

We enter the world in a state of innocence and some of us get to leave the world in a state of innocence.

I thought regular readers would be amused to see the list below of the top 30 search requests which have led people to look at decline and falls. For those of you who are not fellow bloggers, this is part of the statistics report that blog.co.uk provides to its authors.

I find it hilarious and alarming that the most popular search request, accounting for more searches than all others put together, is 'how to steal electricity'. I can't imagine how disappointed the searchers would be to read the one mention on my site to this subject, a reference to how my Dad would use a phonebox at lunchtime, rather than steal his employers telephone service or electricity. It was a reflection on declining moral standards, rather than a 'how to manual'.

Another popular theme is 'rockstar deaths'. My only reference to this subject was when I related the death of a resident who choked on his own vomit, a form of death more commonly associated with rockstars. Again, I doubt that the searcher found what they were looking for on my blog.

The saddest search requests are those which ask personal questions, as though they are consulting the oracle at Delphi, rather than conducting a google search. I wonder what happened to the gentleman who asked at #30, "my wife suffers from "rheumatoid arthritis" and keeps neglecting her self. should i leave". I do hope that they were able to find a way to remain together. Similarly, I hope that the person who is worrying about what will happen when s/he can no longer care for a quadriplegic spouse found the reassurance they were seeking.

I forget what reference I made to Kenny Gee, the saxophonist, but somehow I doubt that it was a flattering one and unlikely therefore to appeal to a fan searching for information about him.

Finally, it tickles me that Dad has inadvertently stumbled across a new fashion trend with his penchant for wearing two belts, even though neither is passed through the loops of his trouser waistband.

I shall report on this again in future. Do any fellow bloggers experience similarly intriguing search requests?

1) how to steal electricity
2) rock star deaths
3) declineandfalls.blog.co.uk
4) rockstar deaths
5) cheers in polish
6) polish cheerS
7) swelliing
8) care of swollen hand
9) travelator mobility aid
10)how to decline power of attorney
11) Profile of Kenny Gee Saxophonist
12) TOOTHLESS WOMEN SMILE
13) SWOLLEN HAND IN THE ELDERLY
14) why employer decline 40k
15) stroke swollen hand
16) what happens to quadriplegic when spouse can't care for him anymore
17) is it safe to go on holiday with a swollen hand?
18) whisky decline
19) social reason of declining wrist watches of last five years
20) perambulatory in a sentence
21) how to help patient stand up after falling down
22) how do i steal electricity
23) "wearing two belts" mens fashion
24) "stockinged feet"
25) Polish Military Medals
26) laugh pissed himself
27) 'decline and falls.blog.co.uk'
28) decline power of attorney
29) Siberian Wind
30) my wife suffers from "rheumatoid arthritis" and keeps neglecting her self. should i leave

Progress at last! Deputy manager L's face is all smiles when she tells me that Dad's wheelchair has been fixed with two new inner tubes. P reports that Dad has been walking a few paces again, although he gets very breathless. The only problem is that they have misplaced the footplates for the wheelchair, so I can't take him out in it. P also gives me one of Dad's favourite woollen sleeveless cardigans that has been shrunk so that it looks like one of Basil Brush's waistcoats. 'You can claim compensation downstairs,' says P, 'it doesn't bother me at all because it was one of the night staff that did it.'

Dad and I go to our local for a couple of drinks. I ask him a few questions to stimulate his grey matter, but I have learned that this is a futile approach. When I ask him who's been looking after him this week, Dad says 'I don't know and I've given up worrying about not being able to remember.' So that put me in my place.

But Dad can still remember the war. I tell him about a new Max Hastings biography of Churchill that has been serialised in the newspaper. Today's extract was about how Churchill never wanted the D-day landings because he feared they would be a disaster. Instead, he lobbied for driving the Nazis out of North Africa and a Mediterranean campaign, but was overruled by the American Generals. The article went on to say that in the end, Churchill was proved wrong because the D-day landings were a success. I put this to Dad who says, 'yes they were thought of as a great success at the time, but looking back now it's hard to see why when you think of the casualties.' I still find it incredible that Dad can't remember the name of his carer today, but can express such cogent thoughts about events of 65 years ago.

Once again I am inundated with offers of assistance from fellow pub drinkers when the time comes to get Dad into his wheelchair. Thankfully, he manages to raise himself a few inches so that I can swing him round into the seat. I have to lift each foot onto the footplate. Each time I do so, I notice how cold his lower legs are which I suppose is a sign of poor circulation and why he struggles to walk.

After his usual white knuckle ride home along the uneven pavements, I return Dad in one piece to the care home and kiss him good night. On the way out, I show L the shrunken waistcoat that yesterday was lambs wool but today resembles snooker table felt. The process for compensation is that I have to buy a replacement pullover and then present the receipt for a refund. Although this time I shall buy an acrylic pullover that they can't destroy.

I rejoin my family in Wales for the last few days of our Summer holiday. Late on Friday evening, I notice a missed call from the care home. Mobile reception comes and goes in this remote area of Pembrokeshire. To check my messages, I have to walk to the top of a hill in a neighbouring field. I decide to leave it until the morning.

Inevitably I start to fret about the message and it gives me a restless night. It brings back bad memories of when my wife and I returned from a holiday in France, before the days of mobile phones, to a phone message from Dad about my Mum. She had died suddenly and I knew it as soon as I heard Dad's voice.

A call from the care home often means that Dad has had a fall - a phonecall to the family is part of their process. So far, these have never amounted to more than a few bruises. But what if this time it is more serious? At first light, I put on my boots and hike up to the top field to check my messages, wondering if I will need to make a dash back home.

R from the care home has left me a voice message. She invites me and my family to a barbeque party in 10 days time. Simultaneously, I am irritated that they have phoned me while on holiday with such a trivial message and relieved that it is nothing more serious.

Take Dad to the pub again, making it two nights in a row. It's a special occasion because my old mate Kev is visiting and said he was keen to see Dad, whom he knew well from when we all lived in Manchester.

Getting Dad into his wheelchair is becoming a major problem. He has lost all strength in his legs. When he stands up, he can't raise himself more than a few inches from the seat. As I try to lift him into position, I immediately feel a strain in my groin. Clearly I'm not doing it right. Dad is about 12 stone, but a complete dead weight. The last thing I need right now is a hernia, so I need to watch what I'm doing.

Kev and I are understandably keen to get to the pub and set off at normal walking pace. But the speed of travel gives Dad the spins. 'Slow down, for Gods sake slow down!' he protests several times on the half mile journey to the pub.

When we arrive and find a table, I tell Dad that I think it's easier if he stays in the wheelchair, rather than try to get him onto the bench seat. I'm conscious that he hasn't had a wee before going out, so if I need to get him to the loo in a hurry, this would be an extra obstacle. Dad simply doesn't get this at all and keeps saying that he will be better when he's sitting down. After trying to explain it unsuccessfully several times, I simply move on the conversation to a new topic.

Dad is delighted to see Kev and listens eagerly to all his stories. Dad also listens to all the same stories I told him yesterday with equal rapture, as though he had never heard them before.

Later, Kev tells me that he was impressed that Dad has retained his mental acuity to take an active part in the conversation, even if he has lost the ability to contribute very much himself.

Dad's unused postal voting ballot papers for the European elections were forwarded to me recently from his old address. It came with a Royal Mail sticker warning of the dangers of mail at former addresses being used for identity theft. You might think that if someone wanted to steal an identity, they would pick one that was a little less confused than my Dad. But of course, this is the very reason why he is so vulnerable. As Dad's attorney, I've had all his financial correspondence sent to my home for some years.

I'm determined to preserve Dad's right to vote. Postal voting is ideal for housebound people - so long as they retain the mental agility to understand which bits to sign, where to put the cross, which envelope to put inside the other, which to seal and where to send it. Every time I sit down to complete this task, I feel myself on that slippery slope towards dementia

Yet elections are not as exciting as they used to be. I have vivid childhood memories of candidates kerb crawling our streets while broadcasting their messages through squawk boxes, election posters in every other window, weighty pamphlets dropping through the letterbox. In those days, politics seemed so larger than life, before the UK became a small vessel bobbing around in the current of European and global forces.

Every election provoked an argument in our family because Dad voted Labour and Mum voted Conservative, so their votes would cancel each other out. Clearly, this was a complete waste of time and shoe leather, but Dad insisted they should both exercise their democratic right. It took Mrs Thatcher to resolve this conflict. From then onwards, my parents both backed the same horse.

As is often the case, I had previously advised the Council democratic services team back in October of last year, with the result that Dad is currently registered to vote at two addresses. I'm assured that this will be resolved next month when all the care homes in the area have to list their residents.

It has struck me before that the electoral services team are one of the very few organisations who allow me to act on behalf of someone without any proof of my ID. I can register someone other than myself to receive a postal vote at an address that I don't live at. Completing a postal vote requires only a signature as proof of identity. I don't wish to state the bleeding obvious, but it seems to me that this would be very easy to falsify. Democracy is only protected by spotting unusual voting behaviour, which in this day and age, means an abnormally high voter turnout!

As I write, my hands are stained blood red with metallic paint from the wheelchair that I used to take Dad to the pub this evening. Two months after Dad's own expensive wheelchair had its inner tubes destroyed by a 'careless carer' using it with deflated tyres, it has still not been fixed.

I visited Dad unannounced after two week's holiday. When I arrive, he is having his supper in the dining room, unshaven, wearing a shirt with misaligned buttons and his trousers open at the crotch. P tells me she thought I was on leave for another 2 weeks. What do I have to do to register simple information? P sees I am unhappy with Dad's appearance. 'He was dressed by the night staff,' she tells me, without realising that this hardly excuses why no-one has noticed his disarray all day.

'Your Dad's been very upset,' says P. I ask her what he's been upset about. 'You being away of course!' she replies a little rather shortly. I look at Dad and notice that he seems unusually tired and confused. I wonder what kind of a state he's been in.

Dad is still keen to go to the pub, but he's not himself. He oohs and aahs over every crack and bump in the road. The wheelchair I am given instead of his own is simply not roadworthy; the type of ancient contraption you would expect to see used by a landmine victim in some war-torn, third world country, not a resident in an £800 per week nursing home. The footplates keep falling off, causing Dad's feet to drag dangerously on the ground. The handgrips come off in my hand at the slightest incline. Somehow, the paintwork remains wet inside the metal tubes of the handle, even though the paint job is years old, judging by the amount of knocks and scuffs on the frame. So when Dad protests that he feels 'insecure', for once he had good reason.

When we get to the pub, I can't get him out of the chair onto the bench seat. A fellow drinker offers to help, but I decline. I don't dare risk his well meaning gesture turning to catastrophe if Dad ends up being dropped on the floor as a result of incompetent assistance.

Finally I discover why Dad can't get up. He has been tied into the seat at the waist with a broken seatbelt. At this point, I resolve to get 'assertive' with the care staff when I return.

I tell Dad all about our family holiday at our caravan in West Wales - two weeks with the kids in the outdoors - surfing, kayaking and fishing. Dad listens with pleasure, supping his beer and large whiskey chaser. When the mood takes him, he also has a drink out of my pint. Dad has become a 'minesweeper' in his dotage.

We talk about some of our own family holidays from decades ago. Well, I remind him of stories that Dad fails to remember. Like the time in Lloret de Mar when I was about eleven or twelve, when Dad stomped off into the night after some minor argument with Mum. When he hadn't returned by 2am, Mum sent me out to find him. I remember vividly tracking him down to a wild west saloon bar, I think called the 'OK Corall'. It had authentic swing doors like in a Western. Dad was delighted to see me. He then insisted that we dropped in for a quick one at the 'tropical bar', where he fell over a drinks table and landed head first in the carp pond. I remember an equally drunken Glaswegian man slumped against the wall of the lift looking at us both and saying, 'I don't know which of ye it is, but one of yews two is in big trouble tonight.'

Dad tells me he wishes he could remember all these stories himself - though I'm not sure that he's ever remembered this story in the way that I can. Nor could he ever account for all the Spanish 'friends' who the next day would hail him across the street by name, to my Mum's extreme displeasure.

As we turn the corner towards the care home, I hear the 'help lady' shouting pathetically for help, her hopeless cries carried by the late Summer breeze.

I've discovered that the best way to keep Dad in touch while I'm on holiday is to send him a postcard every other day. When I was a kid living in Manchester, Dad went to London for a six week course and did the same. I still have the thirty or so postcards he sent me with every tourist image of '60s London. Dad has always preferred a letter to a phonecall, because he likes to re-read and digest. Now with his eyesight and memory failure, a postcard is a perfect solution. Meanwhile, as technology marches relentlessly forward, I am writing this blog using wifi access from the caravan site in West Wales.

Leaving Dad to go on holiday was as difficult as I had built it up to be. More like leaving a child on their first day at school. It was compounded by my being short on time. Dad's world is a very slow one in which everything happens at a creeping pace. I have to crash through the gears to get down to his speed.

In the next room, the 'Help' lady was calling loudly for help in her corncrake voice. Today there was a new variant, 'how long before I can take my clothes off?' I couldn't resist a look through the door at this point. She repeated her request loudly all through my visit. I learned that having just got out of bed, she wanted to go back into her nightclothes.

The other big news is that Dad is moving downstairs to the ground floor as part of a 'decanting process'. The mad ones rise to the top and the more easy to deal with go to the bottom. Sounds like a metaphor for life.

I had to choose the room for him, which felt like a big decision to make when I was in a hurry. I chose a room on the same side so there would be no substantial change in aspect or lighting conditions. It's at the end of the corridor, so less likely to be noisy, and close to a window seat. The extra distance won't matter as Dad never walks this journey now anyway.

As I left, I made them promise me not to move Dad before they have moved out the harpies. I could not bear for Dad to be interfered with again by these poor sad demented old crones who love nothing more than a good rummage in someone else's cupboard.

'Your Dad has spent all afternoon at a party,' says R as I arrive at the care home. 'We've been celebrating a 100th birthday!'.

On the way upstairs I wonder what it would be like to celebrate Dad's 100th birthday. Sixteen years from now, I will be 61 years old. In theory, by then, all the children will have left the nest and I will be thinking about whether I will ever be able to afford to retire myself. Should Dad live that long, where will he live, once his life's savings are all used up? Given the projections for the increasingly elderly population, I wonder whether he will end up having to either pay for him out of our own pocket, or move him to some kind of state sponsored dormitory?

What kind of a mental state would he be in by then at his current rate of decline? (What kind of mental state would I be in by then?) The nightmare scenario would be a reverse of 'John Brown's body lies a mouldering in his grave', where his mind has long since departed but his body keeps marching on, on, on.

I take Dad out into the garden with a large whiskey and a beer for me. 'So,' I say, 'you went to a party today?'. 'If you could call it that,' says Dad with a scowl. 'People pretending to enjoy themselves for no reason.' 'Weren't they celebrating a 100th birthday?'. 'Oh, yes,' says Dad, 'I was trying to forgot about that part.'

After a conversation with the duty manager, I tell Dad about his trip to the dental hospital yesterday for his X-rays, which he has already completely forgotten about. The duty manager explained that they would now have to wait for the letter to go to the GP. Again, I fail to understand why the carer who accompanied Dad to the hospital can't be entrusted with simple information about the results of an X-ray, but it's pointless to ask them this kind of question. The idea that you should receive some information on the spot after a medical examination seems too far fetched for the staff employed by the care home.

Still, I am too relieved to make any fuss that we have finally got Dad to have a dental X-ray for his broken teeth. It has taken me over a year and a half to get this far, during which time Dad has been examined by numerous dentists who have done little more than recommend him to see an oral hygienist.

I have been building up to this visit, because this is probably the last chance I will have to visit Dad for over two weeks, while we are all on holiday at our caravan in Wales. Dad accepts the news stoically. 'It will be painful for me, but it can't be helped and I shall get through the time as best I can.' There's no answer to that, really. Happy holidays!

After dinner, with both hands in the washing up bowl, I tell my wife the story of Dad's imaginary trip to Southport. (See entry below: 'Couldn't organise a feeding-frenzy in a piranha tank') All of a sudden I'm blubbering like Gazza in Italia 90, great big fat tears falling into the sink. I'm not prone to emotional outbursts, nor do I do very much washing up. So either it's a million to one shot that I end up doing both at the same time, or maybe one helped to bring on the other. My wife gives me a big hug and I feel like a little boy again.

It was something about the radiant smile on Dad's face as he told me about this fictitious show he had seen on the beach. How I felt such a phoney afterwards for having told him that it must have been a dream. Why couldn't I have just let him enjoy his false memory? He so rarely has anything to tell me about, because he can't remember things anymore. I could have just let him tell me about it and not spoil the occasion by reminding him how much he is losing his grip on reality.

When Mum died, I never got chance to say goodbye. With Dad, I say goodbye to him day by day, little by little, all the time wondering for how long there will be enough of him left for me to recognise.

I call today to speak to someone who can tell me properly what happened at the hospital yesterday. The deputy manager, A, who is a sensible woman, informs me that the ambulance driver took Dad and his carer to the wrong department of the hospital. By the time the carer had realised the mistake, Dad had missed his appointment. They have now sorted him out with a new appointment which incredibly is tomorrow morning.

Dad went to the hospital today for X-rays in preparation for his dental treatment to remove the roots of his four broken teeth. The care home staff organised his transport to the hospital, but failed to give him a copy of the referral letter. Without the letter, Dad could not be seen. Whoever accompanied him did not have the wit to sort out the problem. So the end result was that the hospital 'returned him to sender'. So now, yet again, Dad has to go back to the referral stage.

When I am told this kind of news, I feel like doing a Basil Fawlty style head banging impression. What is wrong with these people? How can the care home send him to hospital empty-handed? How can a hospital send home an 84 year old man without attempting to work out why he is was supposed to be there?

At times like this, I want to get hold of the health and social care service managers and bang their heads together. It so infuriates me that when their spokespeople on the radio claim that they have the problem of senile dementia under control, because of their strategy for joined up working. I'm sorry, but I wouldn't trust them to organise a feeding frenzy in a piranha tank.

Dad tells me that 'as he wasn't anticipating the outing, he wasn't too disappointed at the outcome.' I have to laugh. Dad doesn't anticipate anything. Even the need to urinate comes as a surprise to him.

It's so hot in the lounge that I take Dad out into the garden to enjoy the last of the evening sunshine. Dad apologises for being unshaven. He has a 2-3 day stubble. In 44 years until Dad moved into a care home, I don't think I had ever seen him with more than a day's beard growth. P says she will shave him before he goes to bed. Why would you want to shave before going to bed, I wonder.

P then repeats a story that she claims Dad enjoyed hearing. I notice a copy of 'People's Friend' magazine on the coffee table and so prepare myself for the worst. Her story is all about an African nurse in her twenties who marries her patient, a 90 year-old, bed-ridden man on the edge of death. Incredibly, under her good care and attention, he transforms into the most spritely nonagenerian. P says to Dad, but you don't really like women, do you? Dad denies that he has ever said such a thing. I think you mean that Dad isn't looking for a wife, P, I say, coming to the rescue. Sometimes I do wonder what goes on in this place.

In the garden, Dad suddenly smiles and tells me that he went on a very enjoyable trip to see a show in Southport. Dad, I say, I don't want to dispel your happy memory, but I don't see how you could have done, because Southport is about 250 miles from here. We discuss what could make Dad think that he'd been to a show in Southport. Had he seen something on telly about Southport? What he confusing it with his trip to the pub last week? Had he dreamt it? We will, of course, never know the answer. But we both agree that if Dad is going to conjure up a memory of visiting a show somewhere, it's good that it's a happy memory. Imagine if you could only invent memories of miserable, boring entertainments?

Then we remember Southport together, a favourite resort on the North West riviera that Mum, Dad and I often used to visit for seaside daytrips from Manchester. Memories of walking miles to the sea across the never ending beaches. Set lunch menus in Chinese restaurants. Fish and chips out of the newspaper before driving home. Happy childhood memories. How wonderful to be reminded of them.

I take Dad to the pub in his wheelchair and link up with my good friend Steve. Dad so enjoys these sessions. Steve is a pub raconteur par excellence and simply being in his presence makes Dad feel like a real person, rather than some decrepit old booby surrounded by mad old women. Dad only lets himself down slightly by constantly pointing to Steve's sweatshirt on the seat and asking who it belongs to. After the nth time Dad asks about the sweatshirt, Steve tries to make a present of it to him, thinking that Dad has taken a liking to it.

I notice that Dad is looking unusually distracted and realise he needs the loo. This is something that I try to avoid in the pub, by making sure Dad pays a visit before he goes out and getting him back before he needs to go again. On this occasion it is unavoidable.

I get Dad back into his wheelchair and steer him through the pub obstacle course. People are always so helpful in rearranging the furniture to allow him access. Only a giant boxer dog fails to get the message, tries to mount him in the wheelchair as we push past.

Fortunately there is a generously sized disabled loo in the pub, which doubles as a womens' toilet. The only problem is that it has a handhold at every angle and Dad grabs hold of every one as I try to steer him into position.

Lifting Dad from the chair and supporting his weight while undoing his pants and removing his incontinence pad is no joke. Eventually we manage it and get Dad seated on the loo. For a moment it seems as though he has forgotten why we came here. Either that or he has decided he doesn't really want to go after all. I remember countless similar experiences with my children when they were younger. So I whistle, run a tap and Dad manages to go. We get his trousers back on and wheel him back to his seat to finish his drink. Steve has hardly noticed the passage of time.

On the way home, Dad repeatedly comments that he doesn't know where he is and frets that I am going to tip him into the gutter with the wheelchair. I promise him that he's in safe hands.

Back at the care home, P greets us warmly and tells Dad it is time for bed after his exciting outing. It's 8pm and Dad is pissed, happy and absolutely exhausted.

E calls to say that Dad fell over again today after trying to walk without having someone to help him. He seems to be OK though he's complaining about stomach ache. They have given him a couple of ibuprofen and will keep an eye on him.

Yesterday I experienced the pitiful sight of Dad's utter panic as T, a student carer, and I tried to move him from a chair into a wheelchair to take him to the loo. This was after abandoning an attempt to assist him to walk there. We quickly had to find a chair to put him behind him before he collapsed.

With the wheelchair in front of him, Dad clamps his hands tightly on the armrests, with no idea how to turn himself round to sit in the seat. The more tired he gets, the lower his knees sink until eventually we have to lift him around into the seat by the waistband of his trousers, all the while trying to stop him from flailing his arms wildly to grab at any available object for support.

When we finally get Dad into the chair, all three of us are exhausted. It's a wonder that he doesn't fall over every day.

I bring Dad a bottle of Polish beer to celebrate the marriage of my brother-in-law to his Polish fiancee. We returned yesterday from the wedding in Warsaw, after enjoying splendid hospitality from our new Polish extended family. Dad enjoys my rendition of the occasion. All the high octane vodka drinking, exuberant singing and dancing brings back fond memories. Dad had a Polish girlfriend himself when he was a young Sergeant in occupied Berlin after the war.

Dad also enjoys the story of taking my in-laws through T5 at Heathrow. With three new knees and a new hip between them, they caused some alarm and confusion at airport security. A security guard had my father-in-law, who struggles with his mobility, standing for several minutes in his stockinged feet, stripped of his trouser belt, his walking stick confiscated, all while being repeatedly frisked and examined around his kneecaps with a metal detector. Can he never have come across an artifical kneejoint before?

Dad is also interested when I tell him about buying some Polish military medals and badges from an old guy at a car boot sale, including a commemorative medal from the Battle for Berlin. I promise to take it to show him on my next visit, and also to put some vodka in the hipflask. Na zdrowie

Dad suddenly looks round in alarm. ‘I’m sorry, son, but I don’t know where I am or what I’m supposed to be doing.'

‘Don’t worry, Dad, I tell him, you’re not supposed to do anything apart from drink your whiskey and wait for your tea. And the reason why you’re here is because you don’t know where you are. If you knew where you were, you wouldn’t need to be here.’

‘Oh, well that’s alright then,’ says Dad and we share a laugh.

Today I meet L, a deputy manager for Dad’s 6 month review. She has just returned from a training course and wears a badge that reads ‘Dignity Champion’. I don’t really understand her explanation of what the course was about, but it sounds like it was all good stuff and she’s clearly now fired up to ‘champion dignity’.

Over the years of helping Dad to access care services, I’ve come to dread the sight of forms, clipboards and cheap biros repaired with sellotape, the tools in trade for professional carers. Either L has failed to locate her clipboard, or this is a new ‘open’ approach. L has a blank pad and simply asks what we think of the care home. It’s very refreshing.

Half an hour later, I finish answering her opening question. Taking care to praise individual members of staff, the cleanliness of the home and the quality of Dad’s bedroom furnishings, all of which are of a high standard, I move onto my pet grievances. Readers of this blog will now be familiar with this list of usual suspects: the chaotic systems, the problems of co-ordinating external medical appointments, the uselessness of Dad’s key worker and, my old favourite, how difficult it is to make sure Dad gets offered a glass of whiskey every day.

I then prompt Dad about one of his frequent complaints – the quality of the food. This completely throws him. Even though I soft soap it as much as possible, Dad can’t bear the idea of complaining. He doesn’t want to be seen as an ungrateful whinger. ‘I wasn’t expecting to be asked that question,’ he says, searching the ceiling for inspiration and wringing his wrists uncomfortably.

Dad can not think of a single thing that he objects to about the food, but this is not helped by his general inability to remember a meal five minutes after he has consumed it. I prompt him that he usually objects to overcooked vegetables and a deficiency of chips. While Dad agrees that both these things are unsatisfactory in principle, he can’t confirm that these are the particular problems that he experiences. L suggests she will come to see him after lunch every day next week and ask how he has enjoyed his meal. For a moment I think she is joking, but she is serious.

L is part of a new management team at the home, so I look forward to seeing the result of this session. She describes to me some planned changes, the most significant of which is a plan to segregate residents according to their care needs. The fitter, more alert ones will be on the ground floor, the mild and severe dementia cases on the first floor and the very intensive need residents on the second floor. With slight nervousness, I ask which floor Dad will be on. ‘The ground floor,’ L tells me, ‘he’s one of our less needy residents. Could have fooled me, I think to myself, but then many of the residents never leave their bedrooms.

This change has pros and cons for Dad. It’s good that he will now have easier access to the garden. Also, the ground floor rooms have ensuite showers. I had originally requested that Dad was placed on the ground floor for this reason, until I discovered that he would have to suffer constant interruptions from all the demented harpies who currently live there. I have never forgotten the sight of them on Dad’s first night in the home, rifling through his clothes while mumbling nonsense to themselves

The major disadvantage, however, is that Dad will no longer be looked after by P, who has been his main carer. When L has gone, I ask Dad how he feels about it, in case I need to kick up a fuss. To my surprise, Dad says he’s not bothered. ‘I cope when she’s not here.’ he says with a resigned air. What a fickle old bastard, I think to myself

I’ve now had chance to consider in more detail the Government’s proposals for reforming elderly care funding.

The Green Paper spells out three options:
1) Government pays for between a quarter and a third of care for everyone. . Those with assets above £23,000 will pay the rest, while those without assets will be paid for in full – which is the current system

Clearly, this option is attractive. My question is, where will the money come from? If it is from general taxation, how much will it cost?

2) Individuals pay a voluntary insurance of around £20,000-25,000, which will pay for care for the rest of their lives

Again, this has merits, if it was possible to set a limit to the cost of future care in this way. Unfortunately, I suspect that too few people will buy it, because they will gamble on not needing it. So, only those who are certain to require care will buy the insurance, resulting in ‘adverse selection’ and inevitably the cost of the premiums will rise steeply

3) Individuals pay a compulsory insurance of around £17-20,000 either at retirement or as an inheritance levy taken at death

I can’t imagine that people will agree to this. It is in effect a tax on retirement that will cause wealthier people to leave the country in droves.

So, while 1 is attractive to anyone who currently has a parent in care paying £40K per annum, I doubt that the public purse can stand for it and I doubt that 2) or 3) can be made to work.

I also wonder if the planners have underestimated the average lifetime cost of care, which according to the report is £30K. Surely this is only because of all the people who postpone care, or are cared for by relatives to avoid the crippling expense. If you felt that you were entitled to care because of having paid for an insurance policy, surely the number of people taking up the option would increase massively?

Well, what do I know? I still maintain that a good quick win is to free care home residents from the burden of paying tax. Now that would be an immediate benefit to help finance the extortionate care home fees, directed with maximum efficiency to those people who most urgently need the funds. So Messrs Burnham and Lansley, what do you think?

The Government announced new proposals for funding elderly care today - here's what the BBC had to say about it. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8148116.stm

I have a better idea, so Health Secretary, Andy Burnham and Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley you may want to sit up and take note.

My policy proposal is this: reduce the rate of taxation for self-paying elderly care home residents to zero. They've paid taxes all their lives. They barely use any public services apart from the occasional ambulance ride and hospital visit - and let's not kid ourselves that they receive anything more than palliative care.

They say there's only two certainties in life, death and taxes. Well they can't cheat death, but wouldn't it be great if we could let them off taxes for the last few years of their life?

Remember folks, you heard it here first.

One mindblowing statistic that I heard on the Radio 4 PM programme today - the UK now has more senior citizens than children. When did that happen?

Dad is very confused today. My younger son and I spend an hour with him, during which time he asks us the same questions around twenty times:
'Where am I?' - We are in the blue lounge, where it's nice and quiet.
'What will happen to that whiskey bottle?' - It will go back in the medicine cabinet when you've had enough.
'Won't you have something to eat and drink as well?' - No, Dad, it's a bit early for me and we will have our dinner when we get home.

Eventually, the goldfish bowl conversation gets the better of me and I tell Dad that we have go home for our tea. I tell myself it's one of those occasions when Dad won't remember us being there five minutes after we've gone.

I knew that Dad was due to go to the dentist on Friday, because someone had telephoned me to tell me so a few weeks ago. Dad doesn't think that he went to the dentist. I ask K, his key worker, whom I see today for only the second time in 9 months. K says that Dad didn''t go to the dentist. He has no idea what I am talking about.

'Look, K,' I say, 'someone rang me to tell me that he was going to the dentist about his broken teeth. I have been asking about this as long as Dad has been here. How can you be his key worker if you don't know anything about it?'

'I'm as new as he is,' says K. 'I'm still tryin' to learn about him.'
'But you're not new at all,' I tell him. 'You just don't know what's going on.'

Eventually P arrives and confirms that Dad did go to the dentist on Friday. He has to go back in September for an X-ray, she tells me.

I feel my blood pressure rising. Why didn't they give him an X-ray? I ask. Surely that was the whole idea of him going there?

P goes downstairs to consult the duty manager. K looks about as confused as Dad.

'So you did go to the dentist?' I say to Dad.
'Did I?' he replies.
'Yes, you know that person in the white coat that was looking inside your mouth.'
'Was that a dentist?' he asks.
'Yes,' I tell him, 'so far as I know.'

P returns to inform me that his appointment in September at the hospital is both for an X-ray and to have the roots extracted. Progress at last.

K is now on the warpath. He comes into the blue lounge, clearly fuming in his gentle African way. There was nothing on the care plan, he tells me, about this appointment. All it said was that he was going to the dentist. K tells me that he is going to make a big fuss about all this.

'OK, thanks K, I say, I'll let you get on now. See you later.' K continues to protest at the incompetence of his colleagues.
'OK K, thanks again for your trouble, I'll let you get on.' He eventually gets the hint.

'So where am I exactly?' says Dad, 'And how am I going to get home?' I tell him that he is in the blue lounge, no more than twenty yards from his bedroom. Dad is amazed by this information.

Five minutes later, after exactly the same conversation, he is equally amazed.

P comes to see me. The dentist says that Dad is not cleaning his teeth properly. Well of course he isn't, he's not doing anything properly. P has to put the toothpaste on his toothbrush and hold his hand inside his mouth to make sure that it happens at all.

On the way out, I talk to P for the first time about Arthur's death. She is still clearly very upset about it. Although he was 95 years old, he was still in good shape. Her version of the story is that A should not have been allowed home from hospital after his fall. He needed 24 hour nursing care, which of course the care home does not provide and as a result ended up choking on is own vomit. 'This kind of thing always happens on my day off,' she tells me.
P went to the funeral and met his son from Canada. 'He was almost as old as Arthur' says P. Her voice goes very thick because she is clearly very emotionally affected by the experience. I tell P to look after herself, because I don't know where Dad would be without her watchful care.

I listen to an interesting programme about Alzheimer’s on Radio 4’s ‘All in the Mind’. A daughter describes her relief at her mother’s diagnosis for Alzheimer’s, because it allows them to say ‘that’s not Mum, that’s the disease’ whenever she starts to swear and shout at them. A medical scientist talks about a new test he is developing that will enable Alzheimer’s to be detected by a simple blood test which identifies a protein marker. This would save having to carry out brain scans using expensive equipment. Not so long ago, Alzheimer’s could only be diagnosed at post mortem. I was fascinated to learn that a healthy brain is smooth, but a diseased brain appears shrivelled because all the dead brain cells cause it to collapse.

My credulity is stretched too far though when a spokesperson talks optimistically about the Health Service’s ability to cope with the rising problem of Alzheimer's. The current estimate of 700,000 cases is forecast to double in the near future as diagnosis improves. According to this person, they plan to diagnose and treat sufferers, while working with social services to support people in their homes. Pull the other one! My experience is that co-ordinating health and social services is a full time job even for an able-minded person. How is anyone going to access all the services if they don’t know what day of the week it is?

The health service simply doesn’t have the resources or can’t organise itself to provide integrated care services. How can it when so much of the patient communication is generated by computers that don’t even state what the hospital appointment is for! It requires a spouse or a family member to take on the role of care manager. And in the words of the nursery rhyme, if you haven't got a helper, then God bless you!

A year ago, Dad was in hospital for a fortnight and was clearly suffering with ‘confusion’. Every day, I asked if he had been assessed by the gerontologist. But the assessment never happened, even though he was physically on the same premises. In the end I concluded that knowing whether Dad had Alzheimer’s or was ‘a bit confused’ was not really going to make any difference to anything.

In the year since then, I have struggled to oversee my Dad’s access to health care services. As I have regularly commented on this blog, the care home struggles to keep track of his appointments and he has twice been sent back to the referral stage because they were incapable of organising transport, or phoning to cancel his appointment.

So when someone from a hospital trust starts talking about health services as though they have everything under control, I want to laugh out loud. The reality is that you should be thankful for what you get and don’t waste your energy in complaining – which is a neat summary of my Dad’s lifelong philosophy on the National Health Service.

The last two weekends I have been so busy with family social commitments that I've struggled to find time to visit Dad. I feel so guilty about this, imagining him sitting in the TV lounge waiting for my visit.

I also feel guilty about his carers. All the residents constantly ask when they will next see their relatives. So if you usually visit on a Sunday, it quickly becomes an expectation that you will visit every Sunday. If for some reason, you miss a Sunday, everyone feels let down and disappointed.

Last Sunday, I felt so bad that I rang to say that I wouldn't be able to visit. I spoke to the care home manager and asked her to give the message to P. But when I visited Dad on Monday, P had not received the message. Clearly the manager had too many other things on her mind.

Today, I had an hour to spare between 'volunteering' for gate duties at my eldest son's school parents' association care boot sale and taking my younger son to Wimbledon - not unfortunately for centre court, but to to see the juniors and veterans finals on Number 1 court (what is it with me and old people?)

Dad is delighted to see me as always. He looks so well at the moment, cleanly shaven and smartly dressed - all thanks to the excellent care he receives from P. So often when I see him, it's at the end of the day when he's tired and his brain doesn't function so well. It's wonderful to see him in the morning when he's so much more bright and alert. Even his memory works today. He's able to remember the flat that he lived in for a year before coming to the care home, which last week he couldn't remember at all.

As a treat, I fix Dad a nice pre-lunch whiskey and we sit out on the balcony to enjoy the view of the garden. I have to promise P that before leaving, I will get him back inside and make sure the door is locked. I understand this is because they don't want to tempt any impulsive suicidal behaviour from the fitter residents.

Unfortunately, when it is time for me to leave, P has to help me, because Dad gets the foot of his zimmer frame wedged in the gap between the balcony paving and the door frame. 'They shouldn't leave it like this,' says P, referring to the gap in the floor. I get the feeling that this is the first time the balcony has been used in a very long time.

I discover why I have not had to replenish Dad's booze stash for so long. Taking Dad to the pub this evening, I ask after his friend Arthur. 'He died,' says Dad, 'A couple of weeks ago. I've been very upset about it.' Though not so upset that he mentioned it to me at the time. Dad can't remember, or wasn't told how Arthur died. 'Don't think there was anything wrong with him. He was just at the age when you pop off for no particular reason,' explains Dad stoically.

So I suspect that Dad has enjoyed the unexpected windfall of drinking up the remains of Arthur's booze supply, which according to P was even larger than Dad's own hoard. Arthur was the only other resident in the care home that Dad admitted to liking. He was in his 90s, but still able to get himself around and, most importantly, he enjoyed a drink. The two of them often had a beer together before their lunch. I believe his only relative was a son in Canada, which always seemed rather sad.

On the way out, I ask B, the duty manager what happened to Arthur. 'Oh, he died over a month ago, at the hospital.' 'Was he ill?' I ask. 'No, He fell over in his room,' says R, a bright young East European girl who works on reception. B gives her a sideways glance. 'And then he brought up this black vomit and choked on it.' We share a collective shudder at the thought of this unpleasant death, which I thought only happened to rock stars.

On the subject of dead rock stars, I ask Dad if he'd heard about Michael Jackson. 'Well yes' says Dad, 'you could hardly avoid it, could you?' 'So what do you make of it then?' 'Well,' says Dad, 'I think it's been coming on for some time.' 'What, his premature death?' Dad laughs. 'Well, wasn't he a hard drinker?' 'Not to my knowledge, Dad,' I reply, 'but let's start the rumour.'

P fusses over Dad more than every tonight. Now that she has lost Arthur I think she's doesn't want to risk losing Dad. She has installed an electric fan by his bed to help with the heat at nighttime. She complains that the tilt mechanism on his new bed headrest is not working properly so she's called out the engineer.

P and I have a laugh together. As well as wearing a watch on both wrists, Dad is now wearing two belts around his middle. 'Oh he loves his belts, bless him,' she says, pinching his cheek.

Dad waits patiently in his room for his promised pub trip. As usual, I had called on the way home from work to give his carers time to ‘toilet’ him and to make sure that he wouldn’t already be in his pyjamas when I arrive at 7pm.

‘The only problem son is that I can’t seem to get my trousers up.’ I look at Dad in his chair. His trouser waist band is around the top of his thighs, like some geriatric parody of street fashion – ‘oldsters in the ‘hood’.

Putting on trousers is a more difficult task than you would think. This is because it involves standing up without holding on to anything long enough to hitch up your pants and fasten the button. Dad can not do this unaided. I have to haul him to his feet, support his weight while I put my arms around his waist and do up his pants. (If there is a better way, I would be glad to know of it.)

The other problem is that Dad’s buttocks have disappeared with age. He was never well endowed in the buttock department. I remember that Dad’s excuse for never attending a school concert or a parents evening was that he couldn’t bear to sit on the hard plastic chairs for long. Without buttocks, trousers tend to fall to a heap at your feet. Perhaps this is what braces are for, or God forbid, elasticated waistbands.

At the pub, Dad repeatedly says that it is ‘nice and quiet’. I doubt that the publican shares his sentiment, as he surveys the empty tables of his pub on a warm Thursday evening in June – a sign of credit crunch Britain. A dog barks outside and Dad almost hits the ceiling in a comically delayed shock reaction.

‘Drink up,’ I tell Dad, as I stand up to buy a second pint. ‘I was making it last,’ says Dad. Foolishly, I encourage him to have a second half, because I feel bad that he was trying to string out this simple pleasure. But Dad now drinks one sip at a time. Even drinking slowly, I still finish my second pint before he starts his second half.

Dad is very lucid. He talks about feeling depressed about his ‘general incompetence’. I ask him if there was anything beyond the normal trials of the day, but he doesn’t want to talk about it. I always think that Dad being vexed with himself is a good sign, because it shows that he has not completely lost his grip on his own identity.

I need to get Dad home before the start of the night shift at 9pm and because I haven’t yet been home. Also Dad is looking tired. He becomes fixated about the wheelchair at the table and who it belongs to. ‘I’ll give you three guesses.’ I tell him. Dad looks baffled, so I spell it out. ‘Well, it’s not mine and there’s no-one else in the pub, so who does that leave?’ Dad says he doesn’t understand how he could own such an impressive vehicle. I tell him that we have borrowed it from the care home, because his own wheelchair has flat tyres. So then we become locked in a circular conversation about how long we have got it for and whether we will have to pay a fine if we are late getting it back. Come on Dad, I say, drink up now.

Dad hates to be rushed and hates even more not being able to finish his drink. So I have to get him into his wheelchair, do a three point turn to manoeuvre him out of the window seat area, find a barman to unlock the other half of the double doors and then finally prise the beer glass out of Dad's double handed grip.

I get Dad home and put him on the loo, while I go to find P. P is getting changed, but says she will put Dad to bed before she goes.

As I go to leave, one of the carers from another floor asks if I am going in the direction of a nearby town. It is the opposite direction to my home, but it doesn’t seem a big deal to go a few miles out of my way for someone whose job involves wiping my Dad's arse. I also feel guilty because he has been waiting to share a lift with P, who is now delayed. On the way out, the chap extends my lift offer to D, a beautiful Ugandan girl, who is one of my Dad’s regular carers. Both started their shifts at 07:30 in the morning and both live at least an hour’s travel from the home.

‘Have you got a brother?’ says the carer who asked me for the lift as I drive to the station. ‘No,’ I tell him, ‘I’m an only child.’ ‘You know,’ he says, ‘there’s another guy who comes to visit your Dad at the weekend.’ ‘That will be me,’ I reply. The carer shakes his head. ‘No, he wears shorts, he’s a big guy, you know’. He puffs out his cheeks and indicates a big belly ‘That's me,’ I repeat with mild irritation. It has no effect. The guy is absolutely and totally convinced that me in my work clothes and me in my weekend clothes are two different people. Perhaps he is right.

Changing the subject, I ask the carer where he is from and he answers Mauritius. ‘Why,’ I ask him would you want to come here from such a beautiful country?’ ‘It’s the difference,’ he tells me. ‘When you are there, you want to be here and when you are here, you want to be there. That’s what I live for, the difference.’ Well, I’ll drink to that, I say.

Remembering that Dad's wheelchair needed some air in its tyres, I take a footpump into the care home with me. I'd bought the chair some months before Dad moved into the home so that we could enjoy trips out together, once Dad's mobility made it hard for him to walk beyond the carpark. It has a wide, comfy seat and is well suited to external terrain. The big wheels have hand rails so that an otherwise fit user can self propel, though Dad has never been tempted by this option. He's quite content these days to be pushed around.

To my puzzlement, I can't find a valve on one of the tyres, nor can I see an inner tube. While scratching my head, Br tries to help me. The valve on the other wheel comes off in his hand. 'This is very bad,' he says. Br explains that the wheelchair has been used with too little air in the tyres and so the valves have been snapped off. I ask if he can get the handyman to fit new inner tubes, but Br shrugs. I know from experience that I will probably need to fix this myself.

I take Dad out in one of the home's chairs to the cricket green near to the home. Dad has no interest in cricket, but it's a nice wide open space and the sun is shining. I go to get us drinks from the club house, slightly worried that Dad might get hit on the head if someone hits a six. The barman asks if I am with the opposition. 'Let's say that I am' I say to get the drinks.

Dad is pleased with his glass of Becks beer. Within a couple of overs, dark storm clouds appear and I realise that once again I have come out unprepared. I can't risk Dad getting cold and wet, so I wheel him back after less than fifteen minutes. Dad is very upset by this, but I reassure him that I'm not going home yet.

We sit in the kitchen dining area, Dad with a whiskey and me with a cup of tea. Dad gets his familiar confusion of thinking he is in a bar - wishful thinking, I suppose. I remind him of how he thought hospital was a theme pub and used to try to buy drinks from the nurses. Dad has no recollection at all of being in hospital. Nor it turns out, can he remember the year he spent in a sheltered flat before the care home.

'Where can you remember living?' I ask him. Open questions are increasinly met with blank looks. Dad can't remember anywhere. 'Give me a clue,' he says, so I say 'Manchester'. 'Well obviously I can remember that, he says.' Eventually, Dad does remember the name of the Manchester suburb where I grew up, that he lived in for forty years. I say the number of our house and he remembers the street name. He even manages to remember the name of a neighbour, which he's very pleased about.

I realise that the memories are still there, but he has lost the ability to connect with them. I am now his only link to his past. Without me, Dad is lost in a confused world of random experience.

I leave work early to attend a 6 month review meeting with the deputy manager of the care home. When I arrive, I get blank looks. She left an hour ago. OK, I say, following my principle that I don't blame the people who just happen to be in the firing line, I'll just add it to my list of complaints under 'poor diary management'.

It's laughably incompetent. Not only is the 6 month review 3 months late, but the person can't even be there at the agreed time. Yet I can't get too angry about it. When I sat down to write my list of subjects to raise, there were more positives than negatives. I know the staff do a really hard job and on the whole, they are hugely cheerful and positive in their approach to the most thankless and underpaid work. I especially like P, who is Dad's main carer. She may be eccentric and Dad struggles to remember her gender, but she is a genuinely caring person who completely understands his needs. The home is clean, modern and I'm still overwhelmed with Dad's brand new electric bed with rubber mattress which will hugely improve his quality of life. No more sleeping on a piss sodden mattress.

No, my major complaint is the poor adherence to systems. The fact that it's so hard to get him to see a dentist or an optician, because they can't prioritise non-essential medical appointments. The fact that something so simple as giving him a proper drink every day - the number one objective of his care plan - somehow seems impossible to achieve. I know this because the level of whiskey in his bottle magically never goes down, the box of lager cans in his wardrobe never empties. It takes so little to keep an old man happy.

Looking on the bright side, the non-appearance of the deputy manager enables me to have a longer visit with Dad. Today has been a big day for him because he went to the hospital to have his swollen hand checked out. In fact, he had arrived home only twenty minutes earlier. Inevitably though, when I say to Dad, 'so, you had a big outing today?' he looks blank and says 'Did I?'. Dad has no recall of having been anywhere. When I prompt him that he has been to the hospital, a faint glimmer of recognition crosses his face, but he can't tell me what happened or what anyone said to him. I later learn from the duty manager that they did a blood test, gave him an x-ray and put him on a stronger dose of ibuprofen.

I'm told that Dad also had a visit today from the incontinence nurse who had to interrupt his bladder test when the ambulance arrived for his hospital appointment. This is a new concept for me, but from what the duty manager tells me, the idea is to supply him with the right size of incontinence pad. This sounds like a strange job, but maybe it wasn't explained to me properly.

Dad looks incredibly well these days, the product I'm sure of a regular regime and a largely alcohol-free life. I'm told that his walking is greatly improved too, though I haven't seen any evidence of it myself.

The one thing that seems to be on an irreversible downward trend is Dad's memory. I tell him that when he can't remember who I am, I shall probably stop visiting him so often. 'I can't blame you for that,' says Dad with a laugh. At least he hasn't lost his sense of humour.

Things are looking up. P has managed to find Dad's missing denture plate, though she is curiously reluctant to say where. Also, his old, piss-sodden bed has gone and been replaced with a state-of-the-art new electric bed with a rubber mattress. Not only will Dad be able to sleep on a dry mattress, but his carers won't risk putting their back out every time they put him to bed. So far, they haven't asked me to dispose of his old bed.

Next, P tells me that Dad has already been out today to enjoy the sunshine. A group of residents went out for a picnic in the park. It's all too much to take in at once and I start to feel light headed with delight at how many things have gone right today. If I ever bought a lottery ticket, it would be time to check my numbers.

Dad brings me quickly down to earth. 'It was rubbish,' he says, in front of P, who looks as though the air has just been let out of her balloon. 'Absolute rubbish!' I try to laugh off Dad's grumpy attack. 'Better than staying indoors all day, though Dad?' 'No,' he says, 'just a load of mad old women. Terrible.'

My daughter and I take Dad in his wheelchair to our favourite pub by the river, where you can sit outside and enjoy a drink while watching the passing rivercraft. We go down a leafy lane, beside an old Norman flint church - no cars, just beautiful cottage gardens.

I let my daughter push the wheelchair and walk alongside Dad. He can't work it out. 'Where is she?' he keeps asking, 'I've lost sight of her.' 'I don't know, Dad,' I say, 'But how come if I'm walking alongside you, you're still moving along?' Dad doesn't get this at all. The idea that my 7 year old daughter could be pushing his wheelchair just doesn't compute. She finds this hilarious and giggles all the way to the pub.

I get Dad a half of bitter and a bowl of chips. He always complains that he doesn't get proper chips, so I like to indulge him whenever I get the chance. But Dad finds it hard to eat while others are not. It's how he was brought up - whatever he had was shared. No-one was allowed to keep anything to themselves. No matter how many times I say that we've already had lunch, Dad keeps asking us to share the chips with him. My daughter happily helps him out, until reaching over for a chip, she knocks her raspberry drink all over my white trousers. I lose my cool at this point at my daughter and my Dad, who both take on the look of a whipped dog.

Before leaving, I ask Dad if he needs to use the loo. He agrees that this would be a good idea, as a precautionary measure. But the pub has no wheelchair ramp, so we give up on the idea. I tell the barman that while I'm no expert on the subject, I think they are supposed to provide wheelchair access by law. Isn't that the Disability Discrimination Act? I had better check up on this, but it seems reasonable that if you're paying good money to drink the beer, you should be able to access the loo.

On the way back, Dad convinces himself that he is being driven in a car. 'But she's not old enough to drive!' he declares when I tell him that his granddaughter is pushing him again. Then when we reach the lobby of the care home, he says, 'but we can't bring the car in here!'

I manage to get Dad to his room, seated on the loo and whisk away his incontinence pad just in time. I go to find P to tell her that we are back. When I get back to Dad a couple of minutes later, it has all gone wrong. Dad has stood up and peed all over his pants, trousers and shoes. P eventually comes to the rescue. I really don't know how they do it. I don't think I could cope for a day on my own without going completely doolally.

Once again I discover a letter from the visiting dental service that has been left in Dad's room for me to stumble upon. This time it is a proposal for a denture plate cleaning service - a snip at only £40 per plate. What happened to the days when you just plonked it in a mug with a steradent tablet? The letter contains some alarming statistic about the proportion of denture plates that have thrush infections on them. Can this be true? What do these senior citizens get up to?

The dental service will not get any cash out of Dad on this occasion, as his denture plate has still not turned up and is almost certainly lost for good. Perhaps someone threw it away, confusing it for some kind of fungal life form.

I am really angry about this and intend to make sure that the care home either find it or cough up for a new one. Shrinking his woollen pullovers was irritating and so was losing his wristwatch. But losing his denture plate is really unforgivable.

It reminds me of the story - probably an urban myth - about the student nurse who is told to scrub all the patients dentures. So she collects them all in a bucket and washes them together, before realising that this is not such a good idea. I am on the lookout for any other residents who might be wearing Dad's denture plate.

Three cheers to my mate Steve, who met up with Dad and I at the local boozer this evening. Dad enjoyed himself like old times and couldn't get enough booze down his neck, even taking gulps out of my pint when the fancy took him. It was such a treat for him to have a few drinks in the pub and enjoy some decent conversation. Had I not been pushing him in his wheelchair, Dad would have floated home on a cloud of alcohol and bonhomie. On the way home I sent Steve a text message thanking him for helping to make an old man blissfully happy. I only hope that our own children will do the same for us if ever we reach the same stage of decrepitude.

The Air France Airbus falling out of the sky last week prompted me to chase up our family solicitor about updating our wills. Are all solicitors chronically slow, or is it just the ones that I use? This process began back in January, when amongst other things, I asked who would look after Dad’s affairs if I were to predecease him. It is an appalling thought, but one that needs to be addressed, as I am an only child.

My solicitor reminds me that legally we would be OK, as he and I both now have lasting power of attorney which allows us to act without the countersignature of the other. ‘That’s great,’ I say, ‘but how long before you retire?’ ‘In about 18 months, ‘ he replies cheerfully, ‘but I would still be able to act on his behalf.’ This is not the reassurance I sought. It hadn’t occurred to me that power of attorney was invested in the solicitor as an individual, rather than as a legal entity, i.e. the firm of solicitors.

It is now clear to me that after my long campaign to establish lasting power of attorney, I will soon need to update it to add a new solicitor to the team. I also need to talk to my wife, as it is clearly in the interests of her and our children that my Dad’s affairs are properly managed. Oh joy.

When I ask if I can take Dad onto the balcony to enjoy the evening sunshine, I discover something that I have always suspected. The balcony is never used, because of a health & safety concern that a resident might ‘fall’ over it. The railing is at chest height. Looking at the condition of the residents, most of them wheelchair bound, I can’t imagine who would be capable of such a feat of acrobatics, but maybe there are some fitter residents I have yet to meet who might combine a suicidal bent with the ability to get over the bar.

P suggests it might be possible for me to take Dad out there on my own, if I took the keys and locked the door behind me. First though they would need to find the keys. I would also have to promise not to let out any of the other residents

It had never occurred to me before but any resident considering suicide would have a difficult job. None of the staircases is steep enough to do more than break a few bones. All the medicines and Dad’s whiskey are all safely locked away. I haven’t checked whether there are any poisonous plants in the garden, but something tells me that will have been thoroughly checked too.

Fortunately, this is something I’ve never had to worry about so far as Dad is concerned. He would never risk invalidating his life insurance policy.

Dad's toothless smile gets the better of me today. Where's your denture plate? I ask. Dad has no idea. I search his room, all his familiar hiding places such as the bathroom cabinet and the pockets of his dressing gown, but there is no sign of it. I ask P, who suggests I look under his bed and down the sides of his armchair. We fail to find it.

This kind of thing gets me so mad. With having lost so many teeth lately, Dad has no more than about 7-8 teeth in his upper jaw. It won't be long before he's not able to chew at all. '|'ve been feeling a bit weird,' Dad says, 'but I couldn't work out why.'

When I look under Dad's bed, I discover that both the vallance and the underside of the mattress are sopping wet with piss. P chooses this moment to talk to me about his bed.

Dad's electronic, vibrating bed, that I busted a gut to transfer into the care home and paid £50 to have certified by an electrician, is apparently not compatible with health and safety, because it does not accommodate the use of a hoist when Dad is too exhausted to get into bed. P asks whether I would be happy for the care home to provide him with a brand new electric bed. This seems like a no-brainer, why would I refuse the offer, especially as the mattress of his own bed is now so piss-sodden as to be an electrical hazard?

What I don't understand is why the option wasn't offered to me in the first place, before I went to such lengths to move it to his new home? The key issue is who is responsible for disposing of the old bed, the care home or me. I make it plain that I have neither the time nor the inclination. We shall wait and see.

Once again, I repeat my plea for the care home to chase up Dad's dental appointment. I am losing my patience with how difficult this has become.

On the way home I reflect on Dad's electronic bed. He bought it around 10 years ago from some snake oil salesman who assured him that it would be the solution to his arthritic pain. Over the years, I think that my children have used the vibrating mattress facility more often than Dad has ever done. I remember how sheepish Dad was at the time about his purchase, knowing that he had been ripped off again and hardly daring to tell me how he was squandering my inheritance. It all seems like such a long time ago now.

V from the care home calls to inform me that Dad has been sent a hospital appointment in two weeks time. ‘For his dental X-ray?’ I ask in hope. V says she doesn’t think so, but she doesn’t know what it’s for. She says that she will speak to the team leader and call me back.

An hour later, V calls back to say that the team leader doesn’t know either, but she offers me the hospital numbers so that I can find out for myself. ‘Have you tried to call them?’ I ask. V says she hasn’t and asks if I want her to. I tell her not to bother.

I call the hospital and get transferred to H, the Doctor’s PA, who is very courteous and helpful. I discover the appointment is with a Doctor who deals with ‘elderly’ and ‘TIA’s. ‘What’s a TIA?’ I ask. Apparently, it’s to do with strokes and mini-strokes. The PA doesn’t know what the appointment is for either, but promises to find out and ring me back. She doubts whether it’s anything to do with Dad’s hospitalisation in October last year, as this now seems a long time ago.

A little while later, H calls to tell me it’s because of Dad’s swollen hand, that he was seen about in April when he went in to have it X-rayed.

No wonder the elderly get confused. What chance has Dad got when he is being looked after by people who are too incurious to inquire about a hospital letter that doesn’t state its purpose? Or is it just me who thinks it’s important to know why an 84 year old man has to interrupt his busy schedule with a half day hospital visit?

‘I told him you would come today!’ declares P, Dad’s main carer, as I pop my head in the TV lounge at the care home. P often claims a psychic ability to predict my movements. Either that or she has checked my holiday dates and assumed I would visit the next day. However she does it, it’s clearly a useful skill when you look after elderly people who constantly ask when they might next be visited by their families.

It’s just before 7pm and Dad is already in his room, though not yet in his pyjamas. He smiles with delight when he sees me. I give him a hug and kiss his unshaven cheek. I notice that he is not wearing his denture plate and that the gap in his front teeth seems broader than usual. ‘How wonderful of you to come,’ says Dad, ‘but I must use the loo. Do you know where it is?’ ‘It’s over there, Dad,’ I say, pointing to his ensuite toilet.

P tells me that Dad has been walking much better recently, but there is little evidence of this as the two of us struggle to get him out of his seat and help him walk the short distance across his room. While Dad shuffles on the spot, P holds his arm and I gently push his back to give him some forward momentum. Walking when in need of the loo is always a stressful experience. When we get him to the toilet, Dad can’t see how he can possibly fit in the space, with his wheelchair, bags of incontinence pads, zimmer frame and P between him and the loo seat. ‘You’re in the way!’ Dad says to P, who dances a two-step as she switches to Dad’s other side so that she can manoeuvre him onto the toilet seat. Dad, meanwhile, grabs any handhold that’s available, whether helpful or not – the handbasin, the emergency chord, his wheelchair. Sometimes you have to tap his hand to get him to release his grip.

While P sorts Dad out, I survey his room and quickly find cause for irritation. Dad’s TV sits on the floor of his room with a large white sticker on it signed illegibly by the deputy manager. It says ‘need to check out – risk of overheating – fire hazard’. P explains that this kind of thing always happens 'on her day off'. What Terry Wogan refers to as ‘the elf and safety brigade’. P agrees that it is nonsense and asks me if I would lift the TV back on the cupboard for her so that we can ‘test it’. I suggest it would help if the TV was turned off occasionally, but P tells me that this never happens ‘on her shift’.

Then I notice a letter from the cataract clinic on the side table offering Dad another appointment. This is how the home has managed to miss two appointments so far – by giving him important letters that simply get lost in the clutter of his room until I find them, too late for them to organise transport. I have previously requested that they deal themselves with any correspondence that clearly relates to his medical care and leave everything else for me, but it seems impossible to enforce this system.

I wheel Dad out into the garden in his wheelchair to enjoy the last of the evening sunshine. On the way, I grab a glass and a jug of water from the kitchen so that Dad can enjoy a whiskey. These days, I bring him a tipple in the hipflask, because it saves having to wait for someone to find the keys to the medicine cabinet where they lock up the whiskey that I bring for his regular use – if only he could remember to ask for it.

I tell Dad all about our Tunisian holiday and update him on the MP expenses scandal. Dad is disgusted with this whole story. Dad belongs to the generation that wouldn’t even use an envelope that belonged to his employer. He would make his personal phonecalls at lunchtime from a public phone box, rather than ‘steal’ his employer’s electricity.

The gap in Dad’s mouth distracts me so much that I ask him if he has lost another tooth. He admits that he has, but can’t remember when or how it happened. ‘I don’t like to trouble you son, but it seems like I’m falling apart.’ I resolve to increase the pressure to get Dad an appointment at the dental hospital. By my reckoning, he now has 4 teeth broken off at the root.

When Dad has polished off a couple of large ones, I wheel him back to his room. The TV has been on for an hour and to my touch seems no warmer than you would expect an old style TV to be. On the way out, I take the cataract clinic letter to the duty manager, M, whom I’ve not met before. I press on her the importance of organising transport well in advance and explain to her my exasperation at how many appointments he has already missed.

After leaving my Dad, I join my wife at an impromptu birthday party for one of her girlfriends. I find myself talking to her Dad, which increasingly seems to be my role in life. But her Dad is a fit and active man in his 60s, a former RAF servicemen who still flies whenever he gets the chance, particularly a Tiger Moths which is a 2 seater bi-planes with a cockpit open to the elements. He tells me an incredible story about all the former Spitfire pilots he has taken up into the skies, men in their 80s who weep with joy at the thrill of being back in the air. He even allows them to take over the controls. ‘They don’t believe they can, but you never forget. Some haven’t flown for 60 years, but when they have their hand on the controls, the years just fall away. Some can even land the plane themselves.’ Stories like this remind me what an incredible generation my father belonged to, and why it can be such a privilege to spend time with them.

Tomorrow we go on holiday to Tunisia for 10 days. After two consecutive wet Augusts in Wales, I promised my family that we would go somewhere this year that was guaranteed to be hot.

Leaving Dad is the hardest bit for me. Telling him that I won't see him for all that time feels like abandoning a child. Dad takes the news bravely, as he has done every time I've told him of our plans over the last few months. Each time, Dad receives the news with great delight for the family, tinged with a personal sadness for him because of our absence.

As it is late, Dad is already in bed. This confuses Dad even more than usual. He convinces himself that we are visiting him in hospital. So when I ask him Dad he wants a whisky nightcap, his first reaction is that he shouldn't really when he is in hospital. I assure him that he's not in hospital, but in his own bed. 'Oh well then,' says Dad, 'that's alright then'. So Dad has a whisky while I drink a beer. Meanwhile, my daughter plays happily with Dad's wheelchair and zimmer frame that she combines to make a rather impressive chariot.

As usual, I bring a stack of booze to stash in his cupboard, but I'm always surprised how much remains from the previous week. 'Dad, if ever you want a drink, you just have to ask for it. The cupboard in your room is like an off license.' 'Is it?' says Dad, 'I had no idea!'. The problem is that Dad's inability to ask for anything means that he so rarely gets. I suggest to Dad that he should see it as a psychology experiment. He's the rat in the trap and I'm the mad scientist, trying to modify his behaviour with alcohol based treats.

In truth, I find it incredible that Dad's failure of memory is now more powerful than his need for alcohol. He can't even remember to ask for a drink. What has my poor old Dad come to?

Dad wants to tell me about how thrilled he is to recognise the oil painting on his wall of a Devon landscape. It used to hang in the living room of our house in Manchester and so represents a strong connection with our shared family past. Dad is so blissfully happy just to look at the picture. I tell him that I remember the artist coming to our house when we still lived in Devon. I would have been no more than 4 years old, the age when we moved back to Manchester. Dad says he can remember this too. 'At the time' says Dad, 'I didn't see why it should be me who owned it, but I'm glad I bought it now,' he says. I puzzle over this strange comment for a moment, before asking Dad what he means. But Dad is not sure he can remember what he meant.

Overall, I'm delighted to say that Dad looks really well and happy today. The swelling on his hand has definitely gone down, although he says it's still a bit sore. I tell Dad that the Deputy manager has contacted me to arrange a date for a 6 month review. Dad can't believe he has lived in the care home that long. He sees it as being more like a few days or weeks. In fact, it is nearer 8 months.

On the way out, I give explicit instructions to the duty manager that we are only to be contacted by text message in an absolute emergency. I write this information on a 'post it' note and stick it on their ontact 'T' card.

I chuckle when I read my travel insurance, which specifically excludes any precondition for any member of my family that could cause our early return. It's hard to think what possible illnesses Dad could possibly develop over the next week that he hasn't already had - beri-beri, sickle cell anaemia, AIDs?

Still, I can look foward to over a week of rest, which sadly means no blog entries for a week or so

E calls me at work to tell me that Dad was seen by a dentist today. So did he have an X-ray done? I ask hopefully. No, says E, but the dentist wants to refer him to see a dental hygienist. His teeth have gone very brown.

Calm down, count to 10. What do I have to do to get Dad a dental X-ray? He has three teeth broken at the root that could be rotting away in his jaw and the dentist is worried about his flossing technique? What is the matter with these people?

E gets back to the dentist and calls me later. Dad needs to be referred to hospital to have a dental X-ray. Why is it so difficult? I splutter. I have an X-ray every time I have a check-up, why can't he? I get the dentist's phone number so that I can speak to her myself.

The dentist, I discover from a very knowledgeable administrator, is in fact a domiciliary dental service. Although they do have a portable X-ray machine, they haven't yet had any training in how to use it, so Dad will have to go to the local hospital.

I'm delighted to discover that the service is provided by the Primary Care Trust. So will Dad be seen on the National Health? I ask, again filled with hope. You can guess the answer. No, that only applies if you are on income support. As Dad is a self-payer in the care home, he has to register as a private patient. I'm surprised they haven't suggested he has some porcelain crowns fitted to complement his soon to be pearly white gnashers

The administrator promises to raise my request with the dentist when she brings back her report and to contact me when a hospital appointment has been arranged. She advises me that the dentist will 'use her discretion' to assess the risk of infection from the teeth roots and therefore whether it's worth putting Dad through the trauma of multiple extractions. The prospect of this, along with a cataract operation, fills both Dad and I with dread. Neither procedure may in the end be worthwhile or necessary, but as yet I don't have a proper professional opinion upon which to help Dad make the decision.

Dad's hand is still swollen pink and sensitive to the touch. I ask what's happening about it every time I visit, but never seem to get anywhere. P, Dad's main carer, says she thinks it must be arthritis and that the soreness of the hand stops him walking because it's too painful to lean on his zimmer frame. I smile through gritted teeth because this is what I've been telling his carers for the last few weeks.

I've now spoken to M, the new home manager, who impresses me as a capable and efficient woman, about all the medical issues that the home has failed to address.

What tipped me over the edge this week was discovering by chance that Dad had again missed his cataract clinic appointment. No-one seems to know why or how. Last time it was because they gave him the letter from the hospital, which he carried around in the basket of his travelator until I discovered it by accident. By then it was too late for them to organise transport, something which normally requires a week's notice. Nor were they able to get through to the clinic to cancel the appointment because 'the phone was always busy'. Failing to attend a hospital appointment means that you tumble down a long snake back to square one and have to ask your GP to write another referral letter. It's now five months later and hey ho, here we go again.

M is very keen to get the name of the person who divulged this information. I honestly can't remember because it was on the phone and I speak to so many people. I sense that she wants to give this person some direct advice about how to release information to relatives.

I'd originally called up to express my frustration about Dad's dental treatment. For six months, I've been asking them to get him to a dentist, because he needs X-rays after a couple of teeth had broken off at the root. Although he doesn't complain about dental pain, I'm worried that the remains of his teeth are rotting in his jaw. So I nearly explode when I'm told that a dentist came last week but Dad couldn't be seen because he hadn't paid in advance. Why did no-one tell me before? Why couldn't they use the cash that I have deposited in his name in the admin office?

So I tell M how unhappy I am about all of this. I can't help but notice that they are very quick to have the doctors put him on antibiotics at the slightest sign of infection, but completely inert when it comes to 'luxury items' like eyesight and dentistry. M promises that she will get onto it. Something tells me that she has a big job on her hands to knock some of her staff into shape.

My son becomes extremely upset when I tell him that I’m not taking him to see his Granddad today. Slightly puzzled by his histrionics, I probe a little deeper and discover that in fact, he desperately wants to visit the Cricket Pro shop on the way to Dad’s care home.

Cricket has taken over our lives this Summer with two sons both playing for both school and local teams. So I need to squeeze taking Dad for a pub lunch into a two hour ‘window’ between kids’ sports fixtures.

When I arrive to collect Dad, he is still being shaved and ‘toileted’. A new carer complains that his electric shaver doesn’t cut, so I have to show him how to remove the foil cover and brush away the densely compacted bristles that have collected since the last time I instructed a different carer.

We arrive at the pub with an hour and a half still on the clock. The bar staff are well trained in spotting wheelchair users and quickly open the double doors, while customers cheerfully vacate a convenient table for us to sit by the window. I waste no time in ordering Dad’s regular ham, egg and chips and a half pint of bitter. Ten minutes later, the food is served.

I finish my lunch and then spend the next hour watching Dad eat with the gusto of a famished tortoise. After twenty minutes, I offer to cut up his ham. Dad happily accepts. I realise that I have inadvertently crossed another threshold of things that I am doing for him. How long before I am offering to put the food in his mouth as well, with accompanying airplane noises?

While Dad eats, I read to him from a professional alumni newsletter. Knowing Dad’s preferences, I focus on the obituaries, rather than the stories of spritely 80 year olds heading off to live with tribes of headhunters in Papua New Guinea. I try not to be distracted by the fact that Dad seems to have lost the ability to listen and chew at the same time.

Dad finishes his last mouthful. I wait for him to swallow before saying that it’s time to leave. Dad suggests he could do with visiting the loo first. ‘No time for that,’ I say, knowing that I can whizz him back to his carers in 5 minutes, while taking him to the pub loo in his wheelchair would be an extremely stressful half hour of time that I simply don’t have.

‘Why doesn’t anyone go to that woman?’ asks my 7 year old daughter. In the next room, an old woman cries for help like a bleating lamb. I once asked a carer what was the matter with her and was told that ‘she just gets frightened when she’s on her own in case something happens’. Since being told this, I no longer pay any attention to her either.

I ask my daughter if she’s ever heard the story of ‘The boy who cried wolf’. She says not. ‘She ought to know it!’ exclaims Dad, delighted with the reference. My parents often told me that this was my favourite story as a child, which is strange when you think it’s about a little boy being devoured by a wolf. Funny also, if I loved the story so much, that I’ve never told it to my children. You can easily see, though, why my parents and Nana, who had lived through World Wars and post war austerity, saw it as a useful way to condition me not to complain unnecessarily.

I ask Dad if he wants to tell the story, but he declines. I doubt that he could remember it well enough, but I always like to give him the chance.

As I start to tell her the story, I realise I have myself forgotten why the boy cries ‘wolf’ in the first place. I tell my daughter it was ‘to play a trick on people’ – was that the reason? But when the wolf does appear, she has no difficulty in guessing that no-one comes to help him when he cries wolf a third time.

Dad enjoys hearing the story as much as my daughter. Telling your Dad nursery stories is a very strange experience, especially one so poignant for his own life. I remember the times that Dad has been so reluctant to ‘cry wolf’ that he has spent the night lying on the floor, rather than press his panic button. His inability to ask for help is something that maddens me, because it prevents him from getting the care that he requires.

At the same time, I’m aware how often I too will persevere stubbornly with something, rather than ask for help; that thin line between character strength and character flaw. Perhaps there should be a counter-story about a boy whose reluctance to cry wolf results in him being devoured?

So never underestimate the power of a story – it’s a cautionary tale for all parents.

My eldest son invented a very funny goldfish impression. He does 'the face' and flicks his hands like dorsal fins and says 'ooh, this is new!ooh, this is new!' as he pretends to swim round the bowl.

I am reminded of this joke when I take Dad out into the garden to enjoy the late evening sunshine. Dad can't get his head around the fact that he is sitting in the garden that he looks out onto from his bedroom, his dining table and the lounge balcony.

We sit outside for an hour and watch the more active residents perform their daily exercise. The gentleman I saw fall over recently is out, dressed like he has stepped out of a Lowry painting with his flat cap, scarf and heavy winter coat. He holds his white stick in front of him and walks with a manic, tottering gait, as though being led by an invisible dog.

An old lady walks with two plastic bags tied onto her heavily squeaking zimmer frame. She has the bone structure of a society debutante, but her skin hangs in folds around her face. The plastic bags are filled with crumbs for the birds that she scatters around the garden.

Then comes Henry, dressed in his pyjamas and slippers. Although probably only in his early 70s, Henry is one of the more demented residents, whom I met on Dad's first day in the care home. He dashes about the garden with a permanently worried look, as though he has witnessed some terrible trauma, although it is more likely to be because he has shat his pants.

Dad enjoys being outdoors, especially as I brought my hipflask with me. He enjoys listening to the birdsong, though I suspect that the birds he claims to see are no more than floaters on his retina.

We talk about swine flu and the poor Scottish couple who have experienced such an unpromising start to their married life, having their wedding photos plastered across the front pages of every newspaper as the couple responsible for bringing pandemic to our shores. I remember how Dad used to upset my Mum by saying loudly 'another good man goes to his doom' every time we passed a wedding party.

When we return to Dad's floor, I show him where we have been sitting for the last hour. I point out the seat and the statuette that I had told Dad to focus his mind on. Not only does Dad not recognise the view, the idea that we had been sitting out there at all comes as a complete revelation to him.

It's not true that people in the UK have no respect for the elderly. If there's one stratum of society that still has respect for an old fella, it's pub drinkers. Taking Dad to the George & Dragon on a beautifully sunny Saturday afternoon, fellow drinkers were falling over themselves to make way for him: unbolting the side door to make room for his wheelchair, moving their chairs to clear a path for him, offering up their tables for him to sit at. There is a a distinct sense of 'there but for the grace of God,' when a pub drinker sees an old timer making his way to the bar, knowing that time is running out before that great last orders is called.

It reminds me of a song that Dad once taught me - I've no idea where he learned it from. The chorus goes like this:
'Enjoy yourself, it's later than you think,
Enjoy yourself, while you're still in the pink
The years go by as quickly as a wink
Enjoy yourself, enjoy yourself it's later than you think.'

Back home in Manchester, I also remember the story of one of the old blokes who regularly used to prop the bar at our local pub. When he died, it was his request to be carried to his grave with a pint of bitter on top of his coffin. The coffin was lowered into the ground and the beer poured in afterwards. A touching final gesture. I also recall that he insisted on being buried during closing time between the lunchtime and the early evening session - in the days of licensing hours - so as not to interfere with any of his pals' drinking.

Even more welcome today is that no-one comes to ask Dad about his war time career. This is a great relief. Not only does Dad hate talking about the War, especially to strangers, it vexes him even more if he can't remember anything not to talk about, if you get my drift.

This whole thing about wanting to show respect for old soldiers is something we have experienced more since Dad has needed a wheelchair to get to the pub. 'Do I look like Methusaleh?' he once asked me after the second person asked him about his war record in a single pub visit.

I ask Dad what he wants to drink. After some discussion, we settle on a whisky. I get myself a pint of bitter and soft drinks for the kids. When I return to the table, Dad points at my pint. 'Whose is that?' he asks. 'It's mine, Dad.' 'Can I have some?' he says. 'Of course,' I say, offering him the pint. Dad holds the glass with both hands, lifts it slowly to his lips, then necks about a quarter of its contents. He wipes his mouth with a resounding smack. 'Thanks for that, son.'

As it's my son's birthday, I slip Dad a £20 note and suggest that he might want to give him a birthday present. 'Yes, what a good idea,' says Dad. He then sits holding the £20 note for several minutes. The suspense kills us, particularly the kids who have no patience at all. 'So are you going to give it to him then?' I ask. 'Well where is he?' says Dad. 'He's right in front of you, I tell him. My son bursts out laughing. Dad springs back in his chair in astonishment. 'So he is!' he declares. 'Here you are, happy birthday!' says Dad as he hands over the cash. My son goes through the motions of gratitude, because he knows that I supplied the money for his Granddad to give him. But it leaves Dad with a great, big, silly smile on his face.

I arrive at the care home clutching several cases of lager that I stash in Dad's wardrobe for his daily ration. Dad is in a distressed state. D, whom I have not met before, struggles to lower him semi naked onto the toilet seat. Dad has 'p-ed his pants' again and is beating himself up over it. 'Is it just coincidence that you've come round, son?' asks Dad. He seems to think that the staff have summoned me on account of his incontinence, forgetting that it is a daily occurrence. Dad rails against the indignity of his condition. I offer to wait outside his bedroom, but he insists I stay, 'so that you know what's happening to me.'

'Poor Dad,' I say, 'you mustn't be hard on yourself, you can't help it. It's just because you can't get to the loo on time.' 'No,' he says, then with a flash of irascibility that I've not seen for a while, 'it's a pity the nursing staff couldn't show a bit more consideration.' This comment appears totally unfounded. D is a charming young African girl with a lovely way about her. I make excuses for him to D, but she is unfazed by his bad temper.

I discover that P has gone away for a few days and Dad is suffering from separation anxiety. Only P knows Dad well enough to avoid these occurences by taking him to the loo when he doesn't want to go, rather than waiting until it's too late. Dad is as miserable as I've seen him in months, tired and depressed. I offer to get him a whisky, which he eagerly accepts. 'Whenever Dad is feeling low, ask him if he wants a whisky,' I counsel M, 'it always cheers him up.' I go to find AM to get her to unlock the medicine cabinet where his whisky is kept. I forget why this was considered necessary, but I don't question the system.

Dad cheers up as we chat. Even he managed to understand what a disaster Alistair Darling's latest budget statement has been, which suggests that the Government is in deeper trouble than they realise. I ask Dad how he had enjoyed the St George's day celebrations they organised in the care home (what will they think of next?), but he can't think of anything at all to say about it, other than that it 'wasn't up to much.' He assures me that it didn't involve any marching. I wished I had been there to see all the African and East European carers waving plastic St George flags around their befuddled charges.

Then Dad suddenly says, 'Sorry son, I farted.' I hadn't noticed, but it causes him to dwell once more on his lack of control over his bodily functions. I tell him the joke about the woman in church who says to her husband 'I think I just did a silent fart' and her husband replies, 'I think you need a hearing aid.' Dad laughs at this, but remains dejected.

So I resort to my guaranteed strategy to inject a warm glow in Dad before I leave. I remind him of how hard he has worked in his life, what a great Dad he is, how much he has done for me and my family over the years and how much I still enjoy his company. It is all true and I make a point of repeating it to him regularly. It is like soothing a child before bedtime.

I can see that he is worn out from all the stresses of the day, so I leave him to get some sleep, to prepare himself to go through all the same frustration and anguish again tomorrow in his groundhog day existence.

The logistical challenge of facilitating my childrens' busy social lives means that my only chance to watch Man U in the FA Cup semi final and visit Dad is to combine the two. This is not something I could have contemplated a year ago. Dad has never been interested in watching sport. His own father was a professional footballer and boxer who made him feel that he never quite 'shaped up'. As a result, Dad developed a lifelong aversion to sport, preferring to devote himself to 'self improving' activities, such as academic study. But these days, Dad is happy for me just to be there beside him, even if I do have one eye on a football game.

Funny thing about football and my Dad; he never once watched me play, unlike my own sons who barely kick a ball without either my wife or I being there to shout encouragement. My own football playing career was short and undistinguished; three seasons as a full back with my cub scout pack, thirty years ago. Cue the violins, handkerchiefs... ee when I were a lad up North, I used to walk a mile or so to the scout hut to share a ride to the game with the team coach. I don't remember ever having a coaching session, except on one occasion when the manager told me, before a ball had even been played, to 'keep my eye on that black lad, he looks a bit quick'. I do remember riding to games with five or six boys in the back seat of his Ford Zephyr, trays of dog food on the parcel shelf (the manager was a commercial rep) while listening to his own stories of football derring-do.

To my surprise, Dad has occasionally told me in the last year that he has watched a Man Utd game. I don't know whether this is because of a nostalgia for his home city, or because he knows they are my team, or because the TV is always on and he is literally a captive audience, incapable of moving elsewhere or changing channel even if he wanted to.

It turns out to be one of those memorable football watching occasions, certainly a unique one. I take a bottle of Hobgoblin ale for Dad and I to share, which puts him in a good mood. We are joined in the TV room by two of the carers who are both big Man U fans, one a West African woman whom I have not met before, who exclaims 'My God!' loudly at every incident and has the loudest handclap of any person I have ever known, and Br, one of Dad's regular carers whom I know to be a fellow red (probably, now I think of it, why Dad has been watching football recently. Br is a very likeable man, originally from Mauritius, who clasps my knee when the excitement gets too much for him. In spite of the result going against us, I can't remember when I last enjoyed watching football so much - a perfect example of why it is the world's greatest sport.

I also meet for the first time K, who is Dad's key worker. I finally discover why I have never met him in 6 months. K only works at the weekend, during the week he works in a National Health hospital. I am appalled to discover that he works 7 days a week, though K tells me that some of his shifts are not very long, and he does take long holidays of 1-2 months when he goes home to Africa.

I ask Dad if he knows K, who grins broadly. Dad says that he has 'seen him around, but never really spoken to him.' I see K look a little crestfallen and I feel embarrassed for him. K reminds Dad that they have in fact spoken many times for a very long time, but it is clear that Dad has no recall whatsoever. To be honest, even I find it difficult to follow what K is saying, so it's hard to imagine him making muchimpression on Dad. I ask K what being a key worker involves, but all I understand from his response is that it involves checking that Dad's room is tidy.

On the way out, P tells me that Dad has been doing lots of good walking in the last few days, even though he is still sitting in his wheelchair without a walker in sight.

'I don't know how you cope with it,' says my wife as I walk through the door, having spent the last ten minutes parked on the driveway, finishing a conversation on my mobile handsfree with R, a duty manager from Dad's care home. It has to be said that receiving recognition from my spouse for my tolerance is a rare, if not unique experience.

It's the first time I had spoken to R, who it turns out had already called home and told my wife that 'her son had been seen by the Doctor'. It was only when R mentioned his 'mild arthritis' that my wife twigged R was talking about her father-in-law, rather than her son. Her sense of panic immediately switched to irritation. 'What do you mean mild arthritis? My father-in-law has chronic rheumatoid arthritis!'

'Don't they ever read the case notes?' my wife asks. This is a subject that I have struggled with for the last 6 months. When Dad moved in to the care home, I filled in a care plan questionnaire the size of a novel. Yet I still find myself endlessly having to repeat the same requests and provide the same information to new staff. I have learned how to do this calmly, for my sake as well as theirs. I can even cope now when someone I have never spoken to before tells me that my Dad has 'a bit of a bad chest' as if this was news to me, when he has suffered from chronic asthma for many decades.

Actually, I am simply delighted that R has taken the trouble to call me about my Dad's medical situation, saving me from having to do my usual detective investigation to find out what's been going on.

My biggest problem is that Dad is a somewhat unreliable witness.

Last week, while we were on holiday, the Doctor arranged for Dad to have an X-ray at the hospital to check that his swollen hand was not because of a fracture. Attending hospital is a big operation for the care home, requiring them to organise transport and lose a team member for most of the day. When I say to Dad, 'I hear you went to hospital last week for an X-ray,', his response is 'Did I? Incredible!'. Thankfully, they didn't find any breaks, so Dad is now on antibiotics and the swelling is finally starting to reduce.

I also spoke to the physiotherapist from the falls service who made her second visit to Dad this week. She has turned out to be a very good egg indeed, and is highly rated by P. Knowing that Dad is inclined to give people like this short shrift, I am delighted to hear that he was 'very co-operative'. But when I ask Dad about it, he has no recollection at all. 'Physio? Remarkable, I had no idea I had been doing that. Well, well, whatever next?!'

My only gripe is that the physio has told him to get rid of the 3 wheel walker and 4 wheel seated travelator and instead use a standard zimmer frame. This is like asking someone to trade in a Porsche for a Robin Reliant. (Let me know if you want to make an offer on a pair of vintage mobility aids - one careful, if unsteady owner)

My hope is that it was only the swollen hand that was stopping Dad from walking, because it was too painful to put pressure on. P says she will make sure that Dad does a little walk every day to get his confidence back. So hopefully we can defer the threat of the nursing home for a while longer.

Finally I discover the ending to the unfinished sentence spoken to me by the woman who didn’t want her father to use a wheelchair, even though he’d just fallen flat on his face.(See previous entry Can’t stand up for falling down)

The answer is: ‘he needs to keep walking, or else he will have to go to a nursing home.’

It was P who lets this information slip when I arrive back from our Easter break to find Dad sitting in the lounge in a wheelchair. P tells me he had barely walked at all in the last week. ‘It takes 2 people to take him to the bathroom now,’ she says, ‘I can’t manage him on my own.’

This is very unwelcome news. In stark terms, a nursing home in our area costs around £60K pa, compared to the £40k pa Dad currently pays for his care home.

P barely avoids admonishing me for not having been to visit Dad all week. I had told Dad but neglected to tell P that we would be away - a tactical mistake, though P is almost as forgetful as Dad. ‘I told him you would visit yesterday, I mean today,’ she says, quickly correcting herself. I later overhear her telling her colleague something about my having a young family – as though she has to remind herself that I have other priorities in my life. I try not to take offence, recognising that maybe I’m just a little sensitive on this subject.

On the way home from Wales, we’d stopped off to visit Dave, an old friend who happens to be quadriplegic. I asked Dave why Dad finds wheelchair rides so uncomfortable. Dave’s advice is that I should let some air out of the tyres – ‘it’s harder work for you, but more comfortable for him.’

I take Dave’s advice before wheeling Dad to the pub for a sundowner – in the wheelchair of course.

Dad still complains, but not as badly. Mostly Dad is afraid that the wheelchair will topple over, or fall out. ‘Oh ye of little faith,’ I say to him,’ repeating what used to be one of his own catchphrases. ‘It just feels a bit dodgy’ he says in reply.

I tell Dad that it’s no wonder he feels unsteady when he spends so much of the day completely still. Pushing Dad along the pavement at a gentle walking pace is like being in the fast lane of a motorway for him.

We enjoy our drink in the sunshine at the local pub. I update Dad on all the latest political gossip: Damian MacBride’s scurrilous e-mails about David Cameron and George Osborne, Jacqui Smith’s expense claim for her husband’s blue movies, Bob Quick flashing his top secret anti Al Queda operational plans. Dad smacks his lips at the taste of real ale and all the political scandal, two of his greatest pleasures in life. All he says in response is ‘I hadn’t heard about any of that.’ Of course I know this, because the only way he gets to learn about what's in the newspapers is if I tell him. And while I also know he will forget it all within an hour, I enjoy his instant appreciation. It’s a bit like playing a pub trivia machine – a wholly transient pleasure.

I notice that Dad’s hands are still swollen. ‘Did you see the Doctor this week?’ I ask. Dad says he can’t really remember. He says they are sensitive to the touch. I suspect that Dad is not walking because he needs to lean on his walker and can’t put pressure on his hand.

P later tells me that Dad did see the Doctor, but doesn’t really know any more. I ask her to make sure Dad sees him again this week. I also ask whether the physiotherapist from the falls service had been in contact. P says that she doesn’t think so.

Sometimes it can be so hard to find out information about simple things. I don’t recognise the duty manager – she seems to be an agency carer, so I resolve to phone up the next day instead.

When I arrive to take Dad out to lunch on this beautiful Spring day, P is not so sure that Dad should be going out. His left hand is swollen, I think with arthritis, and is sensitive to the touch. 'You want to go to the pub Dad, don't you?' I ask. Dad doesn't take much persuading.

Although the kids are dressed in teeshirts and complaining about the heat, we dress Dad in two pullovers, a hat and scarf, while P finds a blanket to put over his legs in the wheelchair. He's not very happy about the blanket because it is some brightly coloured monstrosity that looks like it was made in some 70s hippy commune, but I'm not prepared to waste time finding an alternative.

Before we go, P and I take Dad to the loo. Getting him on the seat is now a 2 man job. I stand outside the room while P sorts him out. As always, I am touched by the tenderness of the conversation between them, like listening to a mother and child.

We set off for the walk down a country lane with pretty mews cottages on either side. Cherry trees are in full blossom and we walk past stunning magnolia trees in full bloom. I point these out to Dad, but he is preoccupied with his personal safety, complaining that he feels as though he is going to topple over in his wheelchair and that I'm pushing him too fast - about 3mph max. This is what happens when you spend a Winter indoors. Dad reminds me of the fairy tale of the Princess who can feel a pea under ten mattresses, because he complains about every slight bump in the pavement, 'oohing' and 'aahing' loudly as though I am subjecting him to torture. The slightest cool breeze has him complaining about the 'cold wind'.

We have lunch at a favourite riverside pub. The sun is warm enough to sit outside, so we eat our lunch while watching the boats cruise past. Dad eats a huge plate of ham egg and chips from a drinks tray on his lap, because I can't fit his wheelchair under the table and can't get him out of the chair on my own.

By the time we get back, Dad is more than ready for his afternoon nap. I make him a cup of tea and leave him in the lounge with Cliff and Alice, who now seem to look forward to my visits as much as Dad.

On the way out, I meet the same lady who annoyed me so much last week with her apparent indifference to the elderly gentlemen, I assumed her father, that she was chaperoning to the pub. Today, she is with an elderly woman. It suddenly occurs to me that perhaps this lady is a volunteer visitor, taking the more mobile residents out for a walk. It turns out that both her parents are residents. She thanks me for helping with her Dad last week and tells me again that he is 'always falling over.' I wonder whether they are 'self-payers' and what the deal is for couples. The thought of paying £80K per year for two parents is mind blowing.

In fact the Falls service call me back the same day. I don't make an issue of the fact that it has taken them six months to contact me. Though I can't resist asking how they got my number. She confirms that my number was on the referring notes from the hospital, so the delay is really inexcusable.

Fortunately, Dad's care home is in the same borough, so they are happy to still go round to visit him. We talk through the options for what services they can provide. I tell her that Dad doesn't need anymore mobility aids. He already has a two wheel zimmer frame, a three wheel walker and a four wheel travelator.

She talks about educating Dad to walk more safely, but I point out that Dad has long since passed the point where he can modify his behaviour in any way, even if he was capable of remembering the advice. These days, Dad needs someone beside him telling him where to put his foot, what to get hold of, when to transfer his weight when sitting down. Usually you still end up having to physically move him into position.

The other suggestion is that the Falls adviser could offer some training to the carers. This is a good idea, I suggest, although the problem is less with his regular carers, who are well trained and familiar with Dad's needs, the problem is with the transient agency care staff. Unfortunately, they are by their nature, transients. So it's hard to see how training the ones who happen to be there on any particular day will help.

So in the end we agree that the best thing would be if the physiotherapist can do some work on Dad there and then. Anything that gets him moving and exercising is a good thing. I do tell her that she will need to be persistent, because Dad is very inclined to tell people that 'he doesn't feel like it today' and then that will be the end of it.

We shall see what happens.

Today I get a message from a physiotherapist at the local council 'falls service', saying they had been trying to contact Dad at his old address. Just as well we weren't relying upon them, because it's now nearly 6 months since Dad had the fall that resulted in his hospitalisation. I return the message out of curiousity really, simply to find out what kind of service they are offering him so long after the event. There is a recorded message to say that there is no-one in the office to take my call. So I leave a message - it will be interesting to see how long before they return it.

As I approach the entrance to the care home, an old fella with an eye patch and a thick white stick makes his way unsteadily towards the car park. I suppress the urge to ask him if he's escaping. At the weekends its sometimes hard to tell who is visiting and who is being visited.

In a surreal, filmic moment, I open the front door and see him fall in the reflection of the door glass. It is a slow motion fall and I turn around just as his glasses go skidding across the ground and stop about fifteen feet away.

I run inside to raise the alarm, then go to his aid. M, is the duty manager and she comes out quickly to help. A woman in her sixties, either a very young wife or perhaps a daughter, strolls over as if it is nothing to do with her. 'It happens all the time,' she says, nonchalantly. The old man turns to me and holds out his arm, beckoning me to pick him up.

A year ago I would have helped him immediately to his feet, but I have since learned that there's no hurry to get someone up until there's a proper plan for what you're going to do next. The old fella doesn't appear to be injured, but who ever knows? I look to M in the expectation that she will take charge. 'Do you want to get a hoist?' I ask her, 'Or a wheelchair?' Before M can respond, the old fella says, 'I'm alright, help me up'. I look again to M, 'Shall we lift him?' She nods. The relative stands watching us. 'Are you going to help?' I ask her. She puts a token hand on his back as I link my arm through the old man's until his armpit is under my shoulder, so that I can easily lift him to a standing position.

Once on his feet, he looks for a while as though he will do a stage fall straight backwards. 'Do you think you should get him a wheelchair?' I say to his relative. 'Well no,' she says, 'He's going to walk to the pub.' I look incredulous. The pub is a good half a mile away and so far the chap hasn't made it half a dozen paces past the front door. 'He has to walk,' she says, 'or else...' but she doesn't bother to finish the sentence.

I turn away feeling inexplicably angry at this woman whom I have never met before in my life. They walk off together, extremely slowly. She does not even hold his arm. 'I always fall over at the same spot,' I hear him say. Indeed, I wonder how many more tumbles they will have en route to the pub and who she will find to assist her.

Although I don't know the first thing about the woman or her relationship to the man, I can't help but judge her for her indifference. Perhaps this is how people get when they see an entire inheritance eaten up in the dog end of a parent's life.

This of course is the the great swindle of increased longevity, it extends the useless, pointless end of your life, while kidding you that you can afford to burn up the best bit even faster, because you know that nowadays, we're all living longer.

Dad is delighted that I have brought a cold bottle of brown ale for us to share before his dinner. He smacks his lips and enjoys every drop, saying that it's better than the meal he's about to have.

One of yesterday's newspapers is on the table - a Daily Mail. Dad shows a great deal of interest in it, so I talk him through the headlines. The main story is about the brutal and pointless murder of a 16 year old boy, Jimmy Mizen, in a baker's shop by a local bully and dope fiend. I tell Dad what happened and show him who is who in the photos. He enjoys this hugely, even though he does say once or twice that 'it will take him a while for all this to sink in.' We talk about all the thousands of similar thugs that Dad dealt with during his long career in criminology.

Dad is still able to talk about something being a 'typical Daily Mail' story. When I get these little flashes, I realise how much of my Dad I still have to cling on to, so much of his company still to enjoy. I resolve to bring in newspapers more often on my visits.

Before leaving, I sort out Dad's watches that he still wears on both wrists, putting them an hour forward and winding the calendar forward three days on one of them. This makes Dad very happy.

I leave as lunch is about to arrive and suggest that Dad may want to visit the loo before he eats. P comes to take over. She says he will probably need a wheelchair as he's not walking too well today. As always, she's right. Just getting Dad to his feet and sitting in the wheelchair is a major effort.

'I'll take you out to the pub next week Dad', I tell him, as I'm leaving

Working from home on a Friday I take the opportunity to drop in on Dad. I always like to mix it up when I make my visits - keeps the staff on their toes and I get a better idea of how Dad is coping at different times of the day.

I find Dad asleep in the lounge, wearing a jumper that I don't recognise and I assume must belong to one of the other residents. Cliff and Alice are both absorbed with their newspapers, or rather they are doing what passes for newspaper reading in an elderly care home. Alice sings the headlines out loud in her thin, strangulated voice that reminds me of a Peter Sellars character. Cliff fights with the newspaper and from time to time holds it three inches from his nose before shaking his head and returning to a spot more paper wrestling. Dad wakes up and declares, as always, how surprised and delighted he is to see me.

A drops by the lounge in her lumbering way and complains that she is feeling unwell. My first thought is that it's a little irresponsible of her to be coming to work with elderly people if she has a bug. I discover that A is in fact pregnant with her first child. I congratulate A and tell her that I hadn't noticed, then feel slightly guilty when she informs me that the baby is due in three months time. A is a large girl and could probably hide a pregnancy right up to her due date.

Cliff also congratulates A, as does Dad when I explain to him what we are talking about. I wonder how strange it must feel for A to work around people that she doesn't feel the need to inform about such a big event in her life, or maybe she has told them and they have forgotten.

Lunch today is fish and chips. I had hoped to have a look at the food, because Dad regularly complains it is not up to much, but that would have involved my staying longer than I could afford. I help Dad to his seat in the dining room, by the window that looks over the garden. I'm pleased that he has bagsied such a nice spot. It takes a very long time to get him from his sofa to the dining table. Dad tends to walk on the spot, all the time protesting that he is 'frightened of falling'.

On the way home I stop by my local branch of the Natwest bank to register my new lasting power of attorney, so that I can write cheques in Dad's name. A woman comes out to process it for me, but turns out to be completely unfamiliar with the new lasting power of attorney forms. She hadn't even heard of them. I have to explain the process to her, all the time thinking 'is this really my job?'

The Natwest woman says that she needs to take a photocopy of the form and warns me it could take some time. As I need to get home for a phonecall, I suggest that she posts it to me, but she is reluctant to do this in case it goes astray. So I wait about half an hour for her to take a copy on what must be a prehistoric photocopier. The wait is so long that I end up reading the Natwest customer magazine, which shows how desperate I was, fascinating as it is to discover that the millionairess Nigella Lawson puts chicken carcases in the freezer until she has enough to make a stock. Actually, I find this rather comforting - it is how I was brought up. Mum and Dad never wasted a penny, which is why he now has enough money to pay for his own retirement care, rather than rely upon the state to provide.

A huge parcel arrives from our family solicitors containing the five signed copies of my lasting power of attorney for Dad that I had requested. This is so that I don't have to wait for one incompetent admin system to return my documents before I can send it out to another.

The new style power of attorney form is a bulky document - about quarter of an inch thick, compared to the old style 'enduring power of attorney' which probably explains why it took nearly a year to complete the process. So many things to get wrong! My Dad has commercial relationships with around forty different businesses, so I shall be spending a lot of money on postage. But I am not complaining, because I am so relieved to have these documents. At last I can manage Dad's finances without needing to get our solicitor to countersign everything.

In the same post, I get a tax demand for Dad, saying he owes £250. When I look into it, I discover that I have incorrectly filled in the age allowance form that they sent me, to save me the job of filling in a tax return. If I get the form wrong, what chance does an elderly person have? I phone up and try to navigate my way through the call forwarding system. On two occasions, I reach dead ends and have to redial for another attempt. Again I wonder how do elderly people cope? I suppose the answer is that they don't.

When I eventually get through, a very nice Welsh chap is perfectly understanding about my mistake, but informs with with some apology that I have to write a letter to explain my mistake. I regularly find that HMRC staff are very helpful people who are imprisoned by an antedeluvian system. When will they be allowed into the twenty first century?

While I am on the phone, I ask him what news on their discovery that my Dad has had the wrong personal tax allowance for the last 19 years, since he turned 65. The helpful chap tells me that my Dad must have failed to return a form. 'But why did he need to fill in a form, when you knew he was 65?' There is no answer to this. I am told that he will be able to claim for the last 6 years, but anything beyond that will require a full investigation. By blood runs cold at the thought of what this could involve. So what happens next? I ask, knowing full well what the answer will be. 'You need to write another letter' says my friend helpfully, 'but it's fine to put it in the same envelope.' Fantastic, I've saved the price of a second class stamp!

At the end of another busy weekend, I spend an hour or so with Dad at the care home. We sit together on the coach and enjoy a quiet chat about not very much while half watching a rather good TV programme about geologists exploring volcanos in Ethiopia.

Dad is very happy today and it's really nice to just hang out together. Although Dad does his usual trick of loudly criticising all the other residents, fortunately most are already in their rooms. He does acknowledge that they probably have similar complaints about him and even says that on the whole, the home 'isn't a bad gaff'. He also talks touchingly about P, his main carer, saying 'she does take good care of me.' I have to say that I have thought for a long time that P is a gem, even if she does sometimes look like she's ready for a good rest herself.

P is pleased with the packet of Marks & Spencers white Y fronts that I have bought Dad at her request, because they are better at holding the incontinence pads in place than his boxer shorts.

So today, everyone is happy and all is well in the world. Except when I come home, feeling chilled out and relaxed, my wife points out that visiting Dad at this time is a convenient way to get out of clearing up after Sunday dinner and dealing with the kids.

While sharing a ride to my younger son's football match this morning, I talked to a local friend about his struggle to pay for school fees. He couldn't believe it when I told him that what he pays for his three children to go to private school is the same amount that my Dad pays for his care home fees. Fortunately we were in stationery traffic at the time, or else I think he would have swerved off the road!

The turning of the seasons is a constant reminder of the speed of Dad's decline. How often I say to myself 'only a year ago, Dad and I did this' - always something that I can't imagine him doing now in his current state of decrepitude.

Today, on what has felt like the first beautiful day of Spring, I went for a walk alone in a local beauty spot. I remembered that my last visit was with Dad and my two youngest kids, about this time a year ago.

We moved Dad down South in the Fall and supporting him through that first dark Winter had seemed like a big achievement. When Spring arrived, I couldn't wait to show him what a beautiful part of the country we had moved him to. I wanted him to see some open country, breathe some fresh air, hear and see the wild birds that he has always loved.

Getting from the car park to the lake had involved walking him down a gentle slope with his four wheeled travelator with built in seat - without doubt the best mobility aid I have ever bought him. Even then he had needed to sit down every thirty paces. In those days, Dad still had some of the old determination that has since largely deserted him. Unfortunately, it took so long that by the time we reached the lake, it had started to rain and we had to turn back.

When we reached the car, there was a terrible smell of dogshit. For some reason, my younger son got the blame and Dad and I complained about the smell all the way home. It was only when we got to Dad's flat that we realised it was Dad who had stepped in the poo. I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning it from his shoes, his carpet, the communal areas of the building and my car.

So the trip was not a great success. Dad had little appreciation for the beauty of the scenery, but a lot of criticism about the activities of other people and my children. I remember him scoffing at what he considered the ridiculous sight of people jogging behind sports prams. 'Why can't they leave the blessed children at home instead of shaking their poor brains around inside their skulls?'

When I finally spotted one of the green parrots that live in the wild near our home (a breeding pair escaped some years ago and now there thousands of them), Dad couldn't see it. But he could still see the mud on my kids clothes after they had pushed each other into muddy puddles during the slow march alongside Granddad.

A year later, asking Dad to walk such a distance, about 400 yards, would be unthinkable - nothing short of cruelty.

The saddest thing of all is realising that I now have so little urge to take Dad out of the care home. His capacity for taking pleasure in his surroundings is outweighed by his protests at the ordeal of getting anywhere. Even a wheelchair ride to the pub causes endless complaint. The ride is too bumpy, it's too cold, the half empty pub is 'too noisy' and 'too full of people'. The end result is that Dad gets completely worn out and I spend the rest of the day in a state of depression. Sometimes I don't feel very cut out for this role.

Martha is one of the residents who haunts the upper floors of the care home. Like a mischievous sprite, she spreads confusion among the other residents and randomly redistributes objects wherever she goes. 'It's my job!' she tells anyone who tries to stop her. She speaks with a strong Scottish accent and is disarmingly assertive. The first time she addresses you, it takes a second or two before you realise that her mind has long ago evacuated her body. She has an intense stare, like the famous photo of Charlie Manson. You can't imagine what goes on behind those eyes. It is as though she has witnessed some unspeakable horror that has permanently unhinged her personality.

Her husband is a handsome, dapper man of a similar age, but with a distinct sadness in his smile. I have only ever said 'hello' to him, but we have sometimes watched TV together, me with Dad on one sofa and him on the opposite sofa, with his arm around Martha's shoulders.

Today I watched him get down on his hands and knees in the lounge, with some difficulty, in order to cut Martha's toenails. While I might have preferred that this intimate scene had taken place in the privacy of her bedroom, at the same time I felt touched by their geriatric love story.

Of course I am sure that some of my cynical friends would say that here was a Scotsman, devastated by the impact of his wife's care home fees on his capital, trying to avoid the additional cost of a chiropodist. I know that was not the case, because he performed the act with such tenderness, before neatly gathering the clippings and putting them in the bin. This was true love of the kind that they never write about in the magazines.

I come home from a social evening at my eldest son's school. My wife tells me that someone called from the care home to say that Dad had another fall, but seems to be fine, nothing to worry about. 'I don't know if he fell, or if he just sat down on the floor,' said the man who left the message. As it is late, I resolve to call Dad the next morning.
I call twice the next day from work, but whenever they try to put me through to the unit, no one answers.

I call again in the early evening from my mobile, while waiting to meet a friend at the pub. This time the phone in the unit is engaged. V, the administrator, kindly offers to go upstairs and check if the receiver is off the hook. Success at last. Now I just have to wait for them to bring Dad to the phone.

Ten minutes later, Dad arrives, breathless and complaining about being rushed. I ask if he is OK after his fall. Dad is a little put out. He says he hadn't planned to tell me about it, in case I was worried. We chat for a few minutes, simply to make his journey to the phone worthwhile, but as usual I conclude that phoning Dad is really more of an inconvenience for him than a pleasure. It is clearly absurd to be calling him to check he is OK, when he is likely to have another fall on the way to the phone. I will suggest to O that they invest in some cordless phones, then may I can phone Dad without causing such stress.

Some good news today, our family solicitor wrote to say that the lasting power of attorney has now been registered with the Office of the Public Guardian, after a campaign lasting around 8 months. Why does everything involving lawyers take so long? The solicitor's bill is a mere £270. At least now I can finally write a cheque on Dad's behalf, without needing the solicitor to countersign it.

The other good news is that the services company who run the block where Dad had his flat have refunded him the service charge of £570 for the remainder of this year. What an extraordinary result! This is the first time that Dad has been refunded money without my having to chase it, because I didn't even realise it was due.

‘Isn’t he looking well?’ asks P as I am about to leave the care home. Dad smiles, in a spirited attempt to live up to her description. ‘You had a lovely bath yesterday, didn’t you?’ says P to Dad, then turning to me adds, ‘he always has a bath, every week.’ I stop myself from saying ‘whether he needs it or not,’ as I haven’t got time for this conversation.

One of my continued frustrations is how I can understand what level of care Dad actually receives and his washing regime is a perfect example. Asking Dad himself is not very reliable, because he can’t remember what he has eaten for lunch. So if I ask Dad how often he gets a shower, he will say that he hasn’t had one for weeks. When I put this jokily to one of his carers, I am usually told that he in fact had a shower only yesterday. I am also told that he has a wash every morning before getting dressed, but I have no idea whether this involves a proper wash or a baptismal style sprinkling of water on the forehead.

The reason for my concern is that on a handful of occasions in the past few months, I have detected a slightly unwashed smell when giving Dad a hug. This has made me suspect that the attention to hygiene is not as good as it could be. While I appreciate that it’s hard to keep someone smelling fresh when they are prone to be a bit leaky in the trouser department, this is a different kind of smell, a sour, musty odour that I associate with homeless people. It always comes as a shock whenever I notice this, because it is so contrary to his nature; Dad is the most fastidiously clean and tidy person I have ever known in my life.

Dad acquired his obsession with personal hygiene during his Army days. When I entered puberty and my own hormone factories started to increase production, I remember him telling me about blokes who suffered from BO being thrown fully clothed into the bath.

Before we had our first shower installed in our family home in the mid-70s, Dad would have a full strip wash every morning. As a child, I remember having a weekly bath, followed by clean pyjamas and underwear which, barring accidents would last the rest of the week; none of the daily bath-time ritual that my generation inflicts on our children. I remember starting to have daily showers on family holidays on the Costa Brava, where Dad liked to have several showers a day.

In recent years, a morning shower became an essential part of Dad’s life. He has suffered from rheumatoid arthritis for several decades, a side effect of the steroids that he was prescribed to control his asthma. Standing under a hot shower was the only way to overcome the stiffness in his joints and to ‘get his body going.’

The showers stopped when I moved him from Manchester to a sheltered flat. Although the bathroom did have a powerful shower (one of the key reasons for selecting it), Dad could not make it work. It was the start of my realisation that Dad could no longer learn anything new. In fact, I can chart my his steady decline in the ever decreasing circles of my attempts to help him maintain his cleanliness.

First I stuck labels on the shower so that he could see which one was water pressure and which one was temperature. But when he took off his glasses to have his shower, he couldn’t read the labels. Then every time he used the shower, he pulled the curtain rail of the wall. I couldn’t understand why this kept happening as it seemed to be securely fitted. Unless of course he was using it like a rope to pull himself into a standing position, which he almost certainly was.

Once he had lost his confidence in using this new shower, I couldn’t make him go back to it. He quickly abandoned his shower habit in favour of a daily bath. Again there were teething problems. Dad complained that there was never any hot water. But every time I went round to his flat there was gallons of the stuff. I would tell Dad to switch on his immersion heater. But he could never remember where it was. Then he wouldn’t remember to switch it off, so that his electricity bills for a single man in a flat were as high as our bills for a family of five!

Eventually I discovered the problem with the hot water. It was when Dad complained that the plug didn’t work properly and he always had to have a quick bath before all the water ran away. When I investigated the problem, I found that the bath had a continental style plug, operated by a wheel beneath the taps. It had never occurred to me, but Dad claimed he had never experienced such a contraption before. He would try to force the plug into the hole, fill the bath, run away a cistern full of hot water, then try to wash in a luke warm shallow bath in the minute or so before it all drained away. My solution was another sticker with a simple arrow, which in fact did the trick for a few months.

Then there was the first occasion that Dad couldn’t get out of the bath, which I have previously described in this blog.

I considered all kinds of solutions to the problem. The obvious one, to convert his bath into a shower, was not as straightforward as it sounds, as he was already reluctant to cope with the shower and I was not confident that he could cope with a shower door. Baths with doors in the side are fine for people with a strong grip, who still have their mental faculties, but was out of the question for Dad. I had visions of him getting trapped in the bath, or flooding the flat below. For similar reasons, I rejected these magical inflating bath seats that you see advertised in the snake oil pages of Sunday newspapers – a great idea in principle, but Dad would not have been able to operate it and it would have been down to me to make sure the battery was recharged.

In the end, we settled with a chair beside the bath and a bath stool inside the bath. Dad simply sat on the chair, swung his legs over the bath, shuffled his bottom onto the bath seat and then washed himself from a seated position, without lowering himself into the water.

Then he couldn’t cope with this anymore. That was when I first contacted Social Services.

Initially, things started to look up. A crack social services team of care managers came in to assess his needs free of charge over a six week period. My main concern was to get him through what I considered to be the most vulnerable part of his day, when he needed to get washed, dressed, take his medication and have breakfast. These tasks, if he completed them, would normally take him all morning and would completely wear him out. If someone could help him with this and make sure he was safely out of the bath, I felt he could get through OK on his own. Social services agreed with me. On their recommendation, I hired a homecare agency to visit him for half an hour a day to help him through this period, at what I thought was a very reasonable cost of £14 per half hour visit.

But it didn’t work. Sometimes they would come to find that he was already out of the bath and dressed. Other times he would still be in bed and by the time he was in the bath, it was time for them to go.

The biggest problem was that Dad simply refused help. Although I explained to him repeatedly that their job was to make sure that the got in and out of the bath safely, he always refused assistance, because of his sense of pride and desire for privacy.

So whenever I visited Dad and read the daily reports of his carers (a different one almost every day of the week) the common themes were ‘Arrived, Mr Davies refused help with bath, made cup of tea, did washing up, left’. Reading these reports would make me see red. ‘What on earth is the point of paying for a carer if the carer doesn’t do anything?’ I would argue with the manager. In the end I had to accept that if Dad wouldn’t allow them to help him, there wasn’t much they could do. Extending the home care to an hour a day, or two hours a day, or all day, would make little difference if Dad was simply not willing to be looked after.

Now that Dad is in a 24 hour care home, it is a different story. They are responsible for his care and wellbeing and I am confident that they deal more effectively with this level of protest. I do wonder though how much of the problem is due to Dad’s reluctance to be washed by someone else. I have noticed before that his once stoical nature has been replaced by a complaining infant. So perhaps a weekly bath and a daily face wash is all that can reasonably be expected?

As I write this, I am making a mental note to talk to O about hygiene expectations when I next get the chance. I don’t want to become a care home inspector, but at the same time, how else can I satisfy myself that my Dad is being properly looked after and that he is getting value for money from his weekly charge of nearly £800!

Dad takes off his pullover and reveals that he is wearing a watch on both wrists. There is nothing clever happening here, such as getting prepared for the clocks going forward in a few week's time. It is simply that the missing watch turned up inside his sock drawer and Dad saw no reason not to wear it as well as the replacement. Is a trend that could catch on? Have I underestimated Dad's potential as a fashion innovator?

Like Dylan Thomas's Lord Cutglass, my Dad's house has always been full of clocks. When I used to visit Dad for the weekend, sleeping in my old bed in the where house I grew up, I'd have to collect all the irritating electronic timepieces he had acquired from magazine reader offers and put them in a drawer out of audible range.

I have noticed before that elderly people approaching life's final hour become fixated with time. An elderly 'friend of the family' that my Mum used to visit when I was a teenager would sit in her armchair, staring at the face of a clock, as though she was counting down time.

So I tell Dad all about the family and my work, about the old friends from college that I saw last week who were eager to pass him their regards. Meanwhile, he interrupts my stories with questions that are all about time: 'What day is it today?','How long have you been here?' 'What time do you have to go?' I know that the last of these questions is a trap because I fall into every time.

Once I have revealed to Dad my planned departure time, he can think about nothing else. He will check his watches constantly, asking me every five minutes to remind him what time I have to leave and asking me to make sure I'm not late.

Dad suffered from anxiety most of his life and even now that he can't remember what he has to worry about, it has become like a reflex action, a form of mental muscle memory. Chill out, Dad I tell him and then realise how difficult it is to imagine Dad in a 'chilled state.' The nearest I come is thinking of him drinking whisky and reading the paper in the dining room, while Mum and I watched TV together in the lounge. All those 70s sitcoms and sketch shows that would make us shriek with laughter, while Dad wrestled with his newspaper and the sound of ice cracking in his drink, never tempted to find out what was the cause of our hilarity. Happy family days.

So I leave him to go home for my dinner. He is watching the news with a glass of whisky and his supper, a mug of tomato soup, a mug of tea and a plate of sandwiches. He's as happy as I have seen him recently and that is a good feeling to leave with.

Dad tells me that he's had a trying day because people have been saying unkind things to him. I ask who has been upsetting him. 'I can't really say', says Dad. 'I can't really remember. I shouldn't have mentioned it.' By now I am sensing that Dad is genuinely upset about something and I want to get to understand what has been going on. 'Is it that you don't want to say,' I ask? It is like trying to coax information from a child about the school bully. 'Is it one of the residents?' I ask. 'Yes,' says Dad, 'I expect so.'
I go through a role call of likely culprits and identify Cliff as the miscreant. 'That seems odd,' I say, ' he seems like such a harmless old cove.' Dad gives me a look to say 'Don't be fooled by appearances.' 'It's probably just me being over sensitive, taking offence at things. I can't even think what it was now, I've put it out of my mind.'

I cheer Dad up by plying him with whisky and talking about my life. He particularly enjoys hearing about my work and office politics. I also tell him how excited our kids are that we have finally joined the twenty first century with a cable TV subscription. I describe the difference between normal TV and TV on demand and how incredible it is that you can pause and rewind live TV. Dad pretends to be fascinated, but in reality the whole digital revolution came too late for him. Dad could not even cope with a digital phone. Entering a number and pressing the green button was one new trick too far for an old dog. I shudder to recall my failed attempt to make his life easier some years ago when he was still living in Manchester, by buying him a pair of cordless digital phones, so that he could have one for upstairs and one for downstairs. For months, Dad cut me off every time I phoned him because he couldn't get the hang of how the phones worked. Then he would press the wrong button so that I couldn't ring him and I'd have to get the neighbours to go round and sort it out for him. Those phones, which were supposed designed specially for old people had so many things that could go wrong that in the end I stuck them back in the box and got out his old analogue phones again.

On the way out I talk to P about Dad saying that Cliff had upset him. 'Oh,' she says, 'Cliff is very argumentative like that. I'll keep them apart in future.' 'Isn't he going home soon,' I ask, remembering that Cliff had come in for a couple of weeks respite care. 'I think he's going to stay now,' she says, 'his wife can't cope with him anymore.'

On the way out, I talk to O, slightly concerned that this falling out, whatever it is about, is going to spoil Dad's happiness. But O has a different take on the story. 'It wasn't Cliff who upset your Dad,' she says, her eyes twinkling in a way that I have come to recognise means that she has a secret knowledge of something, 'it was P who upset your Dad. And I told her off.' I learn that P had, in front of my Dad rubbed Cliff's cheek and said,'isn't he gorgeous?' in a way that she previously had done with Dad. Dad's reaction was like the wounded lament of a rejected child.

Going through some of my Dad's papers today, I came across a letter from EDF energy dated 12 December saying that they would refund him the £184 they owed him. This was the credit in his account when Dad moved into his care home and I cancelled his electricity supply. (Funny how it so often seems to be utility companies owing you money these days, rather than the other way round.) So I check through all Dad's bank statements for the last three months and surprise, surprise, there is no sign of the refund. I phone up EDF and wait 15 minutes to speak to an operator. The only thing I will say in their favour is that they are one of the few companies that will talk to someone contacting them on behalf of someone else. I ask why the money hasn't been refunded. The girl tells me that it often takes several months to do refunds. Why, I ask, when they are so wonderfully efficient at taking the money off customers in the first place. Her excuse is lame even by the standards of utility companies. Apparently 'each cheque has to be individually written by hand.' Well, I am touched by the personal service, but can't EDF pull their finger out and refund the money due to an 84 year old man who has had to wait over four months since cancelling his service! The girl tells me that she will authorise the payment today and reassures me that all customers get the same service regardless of age. I ask her to send me a letter to say that the refund has gone through, to save me phoning again, but I am told that they don't write letters because they are only a call centre. Sometimes I really do despair! EDF has now overtaken Britannia Bulding Society for my personal award for the worst admin system of the year award.

Dad looks so well when I visit him today. He suggest that we go somewhere 'more private' to chat, so we move to the smaller lounge. I bring him his walker and clear a path for him through the many obstacles in the lounge. I am amazed by how steadily Dad is walking today, as though he's just been serviced and had an oil change.

Dad likes this little lounge, but the fire door is on such a heavy spring that he could never manage to open it without toppling over. Hardly anyone ever uses the room and I am reluctant ever to leave him there on his own. I suspect that if he had a fall, it would be a long time before anyone noticed.

I chat about my week, more or less the same conversation as when I saw him a few days ago, but Dad laps it up. Then, rather poignantly, Dad starts to tell me what a surprise it is to see me. He says that he always imagines one day I will just forget about him. But how could I do that Dad, I say? It is at times like this that I realise what a hard world Dad grew up in, how the experience of living through war has conditioned him to think that abandonment is part of life.

I tell Dad the story this week about the 91 year old who took a wrong turn while driving home on his mobility scooter and ended up on a dual carriageway. It amazes me that there are not more stories like this. They are such dangerous contraptions, frequently driven by people who shouldn't be out on their own. I took Dad to test drive one in a mobility clinic several years ago. It was incredible that only eighteen months after I had persuaded him to stop driving a 2 litre car, he was too dangerous to ride a scooter with a max speed of 8mph!

The time comes to leave and Dad says he could 'do with paying a visit'. I have learned by now that this requires a rapid response if Dad is to avoid peeing his pants. Usually by the time Dad feels the need to wee, it is too late. P only copes by regularly 'toileting' him, which means taking him to the loo as a preventive measure.

Again, I clear a path and help him out of his seat onto his walker. Now that he is walking more ably, it is less of a struggle and I start to think that for once I may get him to the loo before he has 'an accident'.

I am now used to the drill. I have to get Dad in front of the bowl, undo his belt, lower his trousers and help him out of the butterfly shaped incontinence pad that is held in place with stretchy string pants. Like most men, Dad prefers to pee standing up. Unfortunately, Dad is so bent double that when his knees touch the toilet bowl, his willy is nowhere near. I start to think this this will be another case of so near yet so far. But Dad holds on. 'I think I'd better sit down', he says. 'That's a good idea,' I tell him. Again, this is easier said than done, as it means wheeling him around 180 degrees and lowering him onto the seat. Dad has this knack of grabbing the wrong handhold, so that we end up working against each other. I reach around to guide him onto the seat, with Dad's bare scrawny buttocks somewhere near my face, like "Carry on care for the elderly". Eventually I lower him down onto the seat so that he can wee. What a wonderful sense of achievement, the first loo visit with Dad in about 6 months that hasn't required a complete change of clothing! I decide to get out while I am ahead, kiss him goodbye as he sits on the loo and go find P to tell her that Dad needs some help. I leave to find a pub where I can watch the second half of my team, Man Utd, in the league cup final.

Dad is finishing his tea when I arrive for my midweek visit. I had left work early, so we finally have the opportunity to call Barclaycard so that he can authorise his new card that arrived in the post a couple of weeks ago. This has been my first opportunity since then to visit Dad during their call centre opening hours.

Some time ago, I became custodian of Dad's credit card and bank card, after a couple of occasions when he misplaced significant quantities of cash. It makes sense for me to keep them as Dad has for some time been incapable of using them without my presence.

The chip and pin revolution marked the end of Dad's ability to pay for anything by credit card. Similarly, he has never used a cashpoint successfully in his life.

Until I moved him down from Manchester, Dad always visited his Natwest branch in person to withdraw cash by cheque. Visiting the girls in the branch was a highlight of his social life. They always made a big fuss of him and would help him to fill out forms, a throwback to the days when banks were at the centre of the community.

But when we moved Dad down South, the nearest Natwest branch for miles was on a busy corner that is simply impossible to get him to. There is nowhere to park within walking distance for him. The nearest car park would have involved dragging him up and down a steep hill and across a four lane main road.

So I tried getting Dad to use a cashpoint instead. It proved impossible.
Even if he could see the writing on the screen, which he couldn't, he was incapable of pressing the buttons in time to prevent the system timing out and the security screen descending. It was one of many tasks that I took on during those first few months of supported living, like washing his clothes, doing his shopping, organising his medical appointments and prescriptions.

Then Dad started to lose cash. As I bought all his food and booze, his need for money was minimal, but suddenly I'd find that he'd got through £100 in a weekend. Was it one of the unknown Good Samaritans who would bring him home after he had got lost helping themselves to the contents of his wallet? Was it someone calling on his flat, conning him out of the money? Was he spending it on loose women? Or had he just dropped it in the street? It was one of those mysteries that we never resolved, but after the second time it happened, I decided to look after his cards and top up his wallet to £50 every time I visited him. I have carried his cards in my wallet ever since. Like all his other correspondence, his card statements come to my home address.

I take Dad to the telephone on his corridor at the helpers station,
so that we can call Barclaycard on their freefone number, as I have found that calling call centres on my mobile phone is an expensive business. But I discover that the phone does not make outside calls. This is news to me, as the need has never arisen before. The only way for Dad to make a phonecall is by going downstairs to the general office. This is why the carers ocasionaly call me when Dad wants to speak to me.

So we have to use my mobile after all. This is a double whammy. Not only do I have to pay for the call at an exorbitant rate, it also means Dad having to cope with new technology.

The first time I pass the phone to Dad for him to identify himself, it slips out of his hand down the sleeve of his jumper. By the time we retrieve it, the call has ended. The second time, Dad accidentally closes the call when he tries to grip the phone. Finally he manages to grip the handset so he can answer the security questions. He has no trouble in saying his name. But when asked for his address, he apologises and says he can't remember. He does manage though to give his correct date of birth, which impresses both him and me.

By now, Dad is enjoying his chat with the woman. Then Dad's brow furrows as the woman launches into a sales spiel about card protection. 'I'd better pass you over to my son,' he says. 'Your Dad is a lovely man,' she tells me. I thank her and then close down the call promptly, wondering what she thinks about Dad's suitability to own a Barclaycard.

So, another good job done, as Dad used to like to say. Dad asks me for about the tenth time since I arrived whether the keys on the table are my keys. 'Yes they are,' I tell him. 'Don't forget them, will you?' 'No Dad', I say, 'I wouldn't be able to drive the car without them, would I?' 'No, I expect not.' Then, Dad indicates his four wheeled travelator. 'Is that your car?' he asks. 'No Dad, I say, it's your walker.' 'Is it really?' says Dad in his perpetually astonished tone, 'I've been wondering whose it was!'

The conversation reminds me of a joke I heard last week about a senior citizen chat up line - 'do I come here often?'

Well blow me. I phone the HMRC today in response to a letter requesting more information about Dad's pensions. I had expected the worst. Regular readers will know that I had recently inquired why Dad still had to fill in a tax return after receiving a letter last year saying he didn't need to bother anymore. So as a gesture of kindness, I was only asked to fill in on his behalf another form which required all the same information, but was on only one page.

So when the letter came asking for more information, I had expected that Dad was going to be hit with some big tax demand. I almost fell off my chair when the admin officer told me they were looking into an error made 19 years ago, when Dad turned 65, and he was not put on the higher age allowance. As a result, he has missed out on around £3000 per annum of extra tax allowance for nearly two decades.

So I am sending them the information straight away in the hope that Dad might be due a tax windfall. Now that would cheer him up.

A deep voice greets me as I arrive in Dad's unit, 'You must be Peregrine,' he says, extending a meaty hand. This is C, a man built like a super heavyweight boxer, who looks even bigger because of the way he has tied his dreadlocks in a bunch on top of his head. C recognises me because he has spent much of the afternoon with Dad going through his photo album. 'Yeah, he told me a lot of stories,' says C with a big smile.

So, the photo album is working! Worth all the trouble of putting it together. C tells me that until recently, he worked as a full timer carer, mainly with special needs people. Then he realised he had a vocation to become a nurse. So now he is training full time, while working all his spare hours as an agency carer so that he can bring home a wage for his wife and children. I am always humbled by people with such a powerful work ethic and desire to improve themselves. I suppose this is Dad's greatest legacy to me, the twin pillars of his own life.

If only the rest of the world were more like C. There has been a lot of media attention recently about a family who receive £30K per annum in benefits - a sum that would require 6 people earning the average salary to pay for in tax contributions. Why should some people be supported by society while others work every hour available? We are far from having the answer to this.

Similarly, there is a lot of talk in the media about how unfair it is that people should have to sell their hourses to pay for the cost of their care. Personally, I don't have a problem with this. Why shouldn't people pay for their own care requirements? Where the problem lies, however, is that some people, while selling their homes to pay for their own care, are also having to pay through taxation for other people to live in the same home at the cost of the state. Even worse, the fees paid by self funders are inflated to subsidise people who are state funded, because local authorities use their bargaining power to drive down the rental cost below an economic rent.

Good luck to the person who sorts this mess out. I suspect that we will be a long time waiting. So in the meantime, I am going to add 'saving for my future care needs' to my evergrowing list of future financial liabilities.