My parents, who live "up north", are getting elderly and sometimes living so far away from them is a bit of a worry.

I got a call from my Mum last weekend to say my Dad had been taken into hospital with acute jaundice. Luckily the tests so far have shown that the reason for his going yellow is simple gallstones.

They are planning to treat these and he is on the mend. I decided to pop up there for the weekend to visit them both.

Apart from anything else, telephone conversations with my mum are usually unsatisfactory as she never asks medical staff the questions I want the answers to and always mispronounces the names of pills so I never know what he is being given.

Getting ready to go at short notice involved the usual last-minute preparations.

"I'm sorry Poppa (the grandchildren's name for my Dad) is ill but what will we eat while you are gone?" asked daughter with a worried frown.

"I'm only going for a few days, you can manage without eating for that long," I told her cheerfully.

It's strange how my family, who constantly moan about how awful my cooking is, seem to think it's a tragedy if they are deprived of home cooked dinners for any time at all.

"The freezer is full, you can find something in there," I reassured her, knowing it was stuffed with pizzas.

"But who will cook?" asked daughter. "You can" I replied, "you know how to use the cooker. Or your Dad can, he knows how to cook." "Does he?" she asked doubtfully. "I thought he could only make pancakes."

"What will I do at the weekend if you're not here?" was her next question.

"The same as you usually do - go out with your friends all day and leave me behind doing the housework."

"What will I do?" asked her Dad. "I won't be able to go to the pub on Saturday night.

"No you won't darling," I replied. "You can stay in and watch romantic comedies with daughter and listen to her talk to her friends on the phone all night like I usually do."

It's nice to be indispensable, although they are both big enough to look after themselves.

No one worries about how I will cope when I'm left on my own. They just presume I can manage - and I can.