HAVE you noticed that, as a species, we're quite an irritating bunch? I find it difficult to believe that there is any other life form on earth that gets on each other's wick as much as we do.

I can't imagine cows getting into a huff because one of their number insists on mooing the theme tune to You've Been Framed all day, or squirrels indulging in a monumental sulk because someone has left a semi-squeezed teabag on the drainer in the communal kitchen.

But we humans find each other incredibly irritating all the time, tutting or harrumphing at the actions of others at every opportunity.

There are some irritations that are pretty much universal: yoghurt pots that won't open; yoghurt pots that will open but which spray strawberry mush across the front of your T-shirt; matches that refuse to light; matches that will light, but only for a millisecond; not being able to find a parking space; and being able to find a parking space and then realising you will have to sell your car to pay for a ticket.

Some irritations, however, are personal. Little niggles that build up until you feel as if you might actually explode outside the Minster, giving people a taste of the display they should have seen, but didn't, on Bonfire Night.

I like to think that I am not unduly irritated by life, but the last week has finally lit my personal touchpaper.

There hasn't been one monumentally irritating incident, but a whole stream of minor disturbances that have left me in a constant state of harrumphability.

It started with a couple of teenage girls giving me evils to rival those of Little Britain's Vicky Pollard.

On the first occasion I was driving out of the street and on the second I was unlocking my own front door. I looked at them in a "hello, how are you" sort of way and they looked at me in a "drop dead, bitch face" sort of way. Nice.

Now in a condition of quizzical bemusement, I picked up the papers and read about the Government's plans for a curriculum for pre-schoolers.

It wasn't the idea that irritated me, it was the hysteria that surrounded it.

Two-year-olds are not going to be sitting algebra exams or be expected to prcis Richard II, they will simply be encouraged to discover numbers and letters while they play.

Most parents do this as a matter of course - "how many bricks are in your tower?", "what colour is the bus?", "look, there's a dog, d-o-g, dog" - so why are we all raging and fuming about it being introduced into professional child care?

Okay, so my mild bemusement had now morphed into bubbling irritation. Which is probably why I found myself shouting insults at the telly when I saw herds of women virtually knocking each other unconscious to get at the Stella McCartney clothes in H&M.

Forgive me I'm wrong, but these are not actually Stella's clothes, are they? She's not flogging the frock she wore to her dad's wedding or the leotard her mum sewed her gym badges on. These aren't "famous" clothes; they aren't even one-offs (H&M has got rail after rail of the things in the stock room, you know).

Yes, they are nice clothes. But they will still be nice clothes tomorrow and the day after that. There is no need for pushing and shoving. So, form an orderly queue please ladies, and stop acting like grasping harridans.

Talking of pushing and shoving brings me to the irritation that finally pushed me over the edge.

As I was waiting to turn right into heavy traffic in Rawcliffe, a young woman wanting to turn left rolled into the back of my car, nudged me out of the way, mounted the pavement and drove off, all while showing me the French manicure on her middle finger.

My explosion of irritation could be seen across York apparently.

Except for anywhere near the Minster.

Updated: 10:45 Monday, November 14, 2005