Earth calling Eircom

Cavan Calling / Steph Booth: My experience of living in Britain and now Ireland has made me ever more suspicious that people who work for the Government or for public utilities are not human. Could there be a planet in deepest space that builds androids programmed to drive any and all humans to the outer reaches of sanity, then transports them to Earth?

When Tony and I moved into rented accommodation, so the builders could get on with renovating our house, we telephoned Eircom about transferring our phone number to our temporary home. We were told it would be done straight away. After more than a week of increasingly frantic calls to Eircom's customer-services department I was told we would have to wait another 15 working days. Unable to cope with my spiralling stress - we really need a telephone - I asked the woman I was talking to if she had a supervisor. She replied that indeed she did, before hanging up on me. I suppose one should have a grudging admiration for her panache.

Since then I have experienced the labyrinthine intricacies of NCT customer inquiries. Tony and I went to reregister our cars at exactly the same time, but as someone, somewhere failed to put my details into the computer neither my car nor me, as its owner, officially exist.

Our Irish friends just laugh and say we will get used to it when we describe these problems. Chill out, forget your urban rush, things will be sorted, they say.

But urban habits are not so easily unlearned, as I discovered one

Sunday when I left Tony reading the papers and drove to the beach.

It was early evening, and as I approached Kiltyclogher two cars went racing past me in the other direction, on what are fairly narrow roads. Rounding a bend in the road, I saw a bicycle piled into the bank. As I got closer I realised a man was underneath it. My first thought was that he had been hit by one of the speeding cars. I pulled up and walked back to him.

Before I got out of the car I gave myself a stern talking to. All my years of urban living made me anxious - actually, frightened would be more honest. Thinking about it rationally, I cannot imagine the lanes of rural Ireland are full of homicidal rapists, but still my conscience did battle with my fear. On the one hand, I was a woman on my own in a deserted country lane. On the other, what if the man was seriously injured? Could I just drive on and leave him? The answer had to be no.

If he was unconscious I would drive into Kiltyclogher for help. If he was conscious I would help him but try to stay out of grabbing range and keep my car keys in my hand, to use as a weapon if necessary.

Looking dazed, and so possibly concussed, the poor man was lying tangled with his bicycle. He appeared to be in his late 50s or early 60s, quite rotund and wearing round glasses that were now sitting over his ear somewhere.

I asked if he was all right; he thought so, he said. Not terribly encouraged, I repeated the question. Again he said he was OK, but he still made no effort to stand. Wanting to make sure he wasn't injured, I told him to get up. While he staggered to his feet I picked up his bicycle, which seemed undamaged. He grasped the handlebars, still looking shaken. Again I asked if he was all right. Again he said he was.

Deciding I could now take his word for it, I scooted back to my car. As I started the engine I glanced in the rear-view mirror to see him weaving up the road. Only then did it dawn on me. He had fallen off his bicycle drunk. My anxiety meant I hadn't got close enough to smell it. When he woke up the next morning, if he remembered the incident at all, he probably thought he had hallucinated an encounter with a particularly bossy English woman. Poor chap.

Next week: curious tourism signs