Mrs Hextol’s bellowing has now

It matters not whether she is remonstrating with me over my failure to plump the cushions on the settee when going to bed, the improper stowage of pans in the kitchen cupboard or eating the last fig roll from the biscuit barrel, I take it all with a beatific grin.

Her stentorian utterances have been sweet music to my ears in recent weeks – for I can actually hear what she is saying!

After much high decibel persuading I finally agreed to get back in touch with those nice people at the audiology department at Hexham General Hospital, to make inquiries about having my hearing aids replaced.

It is something I have been putting off for some time, because of my less than happy relationship with my previous set of audio enhancers.

I lost the left device several years ago, swept from my pocket in the folds of my handkerchief when I was beset by an attack of the sneezes while crossing the court car park opposite the Courant office in Beaumont Street. (I still stubbornly call it the court car park, even though the court itself was foolishly scrapped many moons ago).

You may wonder why the hearing aid was in my pocket, rather than doing its job in my ear, but I had removed it to take a telephone call, and failed to reinsert it.

It was a case of being between the devil and deep blue sea. For while I could hear reasonably well with the device in situ, it also made my aural cavity feel as though it was occupied by an entire colony of fire ants, each one fighting to get out while spraying formic acid like Lewis Hamilton on the podium at Silverstone.

I did think about applying for an immediate replacement but I remembered the stern admonishment from the audiologist that while the National Health hearing aids were free for elderly folk like me, any that were lost – whether dropped down the loo, eaten by the dog or whisked out of the lug by a magpie – had to be paid for at a cost of £68.

The tightwad in me decided while that the left ear was my bad ear, I still had an operational hearing aid in my right ear, which was my really bad ear, so I decided I would muddle through the best I could.

It worked reasonably well for several years, until Mrs Hextol started complaining that the surviving device was emitting a constant high-pitched whistle, which only she and the dog could hear.

Then the bit you plug in your ear fell off and I was once again plunged into the half world of unintelligible television programmes, misunderstood conversations and hurled cushions when I failed to realise Mrs Hexol was talking to me.

The last straw came when my car came back from a routine service and Mrs Hextol said it was making a squealing noise which had not been there when the car went into the garage.

I could not hear it, so declared the screeching was a figment of her vivid imagination and refused to have it investigated.

However, that led to persistent questions about what else I was missing because of my hardness of hearing, and I was eventually inveigled into making an appointment to have my hearing retested, with a view to having new hearing aids purchased.

I was startled to find that there was no longer a drop-in clinic for folk with hearing problems at Hexham, and an appointment had to be main via the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle.

One was secured several weeks hence, and when I reluctantly turned up, I was delighted to hear that because it was more than five years since my previous aids had been issued, I could have new ones free of charge.

After my ears had been tested, I expected to have to wait several weeks for the new devices to be issued.

But to my delight, the audiologist fitted them there and then and I was instantly returned to the world of five senses rather than just four.

I still have to recoil occasionally when Mrs Hextol forgets my hearing has been restored and hollers in my ear that we need bread from the Co-op, in a voice which probably could be heard in the shop itself – but I still cannot hear any untoward squeaking from the car.