I have a bit of a confession to make. I fear I have, unintentionally, caused an unfortunate gentleman a week of torment through the dispensation of ill-informed advice. 'Michael' wrote to me recently over a pickle he was in. (Michael isn't his real name, obviously. If I used his real name, which is David, somebody might work out who he is. Which wouldn't do at all.)
This fine fellow got busted speeding in a rental car whilst on holidays with his good lady wife in New Zealand in 2003. Months later and back home in Ireland, he got a letter demanding payment of an $85 fine. (Around €50, fact fans.) "Which I duly ignored," he writes.
Before you get all judgmental on his ass, who among you wouldn't have done exactly the same thing? I mean, they're hardly going to chase you 11,000-odd miles for a speeding ticket, are they? Are they?
Last week, Michael was in bed. The phone rang. It was 23.15. He ignored it. Two nights later, the same deal. This time he answered, and sure enough, it was the Kiwi Department of Justice. Wanting their cash.
So he asks me these questions three. First, can he be extradited to NZ? Secondly, do Kiwi Secret Service agents operate here and, finally, is he wise to venture out undisguised?
Yes, I replied, he can be extradited to NZ. The good news is I'd be happy to go in his stead. I hear it's a marvellous place altogether, and how else could I get there for €50?
On the second question, I did a bit of research on the NZ Secret Service website. (A website? So much for being secret, eh? Maybe they don't do irony in New Zealand.) You can find out all manner of nice things about their work, like the fact their agents aren't armed. The great jessies.
No mention of their presence over here, though. So the answer to the second question is, I don't know.
The third is where I messed up. I pointed out that while there was no concrete evidence he was in danger, it was perhaps no coincidence the phone calls had started just as the All Blacks were arriving in Ireland. I even suggested their true mission to Ireland might have more to do with making an example of a certain debtor than with pummeling our brave but doomed rugby team.
Naughty me.
The result is that Michael has been in conniptions of fear this past week. The poor chap spent each night cowered in terror, convinced Tama Umaga and Keven Mealamu were going to burst through his bedroom window at any moment and drag him out of bed and down into the kitchen to mercilessly spear tackle him on the tiled floor, all the while demanding their government's $85.
While watching the All Blacks decimate the Irish troops on Saturday, he went through tortures unknown to the likes of us, wincing at every tackle, hiding behind his hands at every bonecrushing collision. Each Irish limb crushed under the overpowering force of the marauding Kiwis felt like one of his own.
I know nothing of his current whereabouts. I fear the worst.
If it's any comfort to you, Michael, a chap I know in Australia emerged unscathed from a similar plight many moons ago.
He dismissed my exhortations to pay off the reams of parking tickets he had accumulated on a previous sojourn back here in the land of his birth and pooh-poohed the very idea that he could face recriminations, feeling himself an untouchable in his Bondi sand castle.
That was until I pointed out Sydney was on U2's next world tour itinerary and he would be wise to cough up the loot to avoid His Wonderfulness Bono turning up on his doorstep and pontificating him to death. My friend, a sensible man, duly posted a cheque to Ireland.
While a visit from the All Blacks pales in comparison to one from The Bombasticon, I advise Michael to take a similar course of action.
