Rutland columnist Allan Grey looks at the strange world of phobias and shares his new one

There is an inexhaustible number of phobias that us 21st Century people can suffer from, writes Rutland columnist Allan Grey.

Some phobias are very well known, like agrophobia, the fear of open spaces, claustrophobia, the fear of enclosed spaces, or ergophobia, something I suffer from increasingly these days, the fear of work. There are phobias most people will have never heard of, like xanthophobia, the fear of the colour yellow, or subxanthophobia, the fear of yellow submarines, or nomophobia, something most people under 35 unknowingly suffer from, the fear of being without their smart phone. Then there’s decidophobia, something else I suffer from, the fear of making a decision. The lovely lady will ask me during the evening: “Are you cycling, walking, having coffee with your septuagenarian buddies, or writing another of your inane articles for the Rutland Times tomorrow?”

I’ll say: “Gosh, it’s much too early to take such a far reaching decision, I’ll need to sleep on it!”

The only phobia I haven’t been able to track down is the phobia of not having a phobia, maybe that’s needaphobia.

In researching though, I think I’ve found the wildest phobia that anyone could suffer. It’s hippopotomostrosesquippedaliophobia, a full 36 letters, and believe it or not, it’s the fear of long words, I kid you not.

Now I’ve been investigating my phobias recently, stimulated by an incident whilst driving the other day. After many years, suddenly I have now developed the fear of turning right in my Mini. This was occasioned having to wait whilst an oncoming car passed me before I was able to make my turn; unfortunately I was in third gear and not first, so yes, I stalled. It doesn’t happen very often but when it does you feel a bit of a septuagenarian.

Before even being able to return the gear lever to neutral and restart the car, the most almighty and lengthy blast of a horn behind shook me to my core. Did it help me start my car any quicker and get out of the way of what could easily have been a centurion tank (have we still got any?). Not at all. In fact it made matters worse as I fumbled with the hand brake, trembled with the gear lever, quaked over the clutch pedal, and had a panic attack trying to find the starter button before I could make way. Once round the corner I glanced back to see if the centurion tank was rumbling on its way, but to my amazement, it wasn’t a tank at all, it was a ... well I’ll let you guess for the moment, but all will be revealed.

Once you get home, and your inner calm has returned, you think of all the other courses of action you could have taken in that situation if you’d just had the speed of thought to put them into action. Wouldn’t it have been great to have got out of your car, approached the vehicle behind, waited until the driver had wound their window down, and then offered to lean on their horn for them whilst they restarted your car, praying of course it wasn’t some 21st Samoan front row forward late for the Tigers morning scrum training session?

Believe it or not I did something very similar to that a couple of years back whilst driving south from Orlando in Florida to stay with friends. I pulled up at a crossroads, at a red light; the junction was one of many where you can turn right on red, but there was traffic coming from my left so I had to stay put. Then the blaring horn of a driver behind me, tooting and honking for all they were worth. This time I did switch my engine off, get out of the car and walk slowly back to the car behind. They wound their window down, I asked politely: “Is there a problem here?”

I got a stream of invective which I think translated roughly as: “I jolly well need to get straight across this junction very quickly you cockamamie Limey imbecile, so shift your trunk sharpish.” (To save our lovely editor the time, I have omitted the many expletives.) Having made my point, I got back into my car and completed the journey south. On arrival at my friends’ house I related the story to them. Well, they were absolutely aghast that I could have been quite so stupid, so foolhardy, OMG what a crazy risk I had taken. The other driver could quite easily have had a gun in their glove compartment, or possibly even an assault rifle on the passenger seat, and in fear for their life, (I can be quite fearsome when walking slowly in red shorts, an I Love Rutland T-shirt and a Miami Dolphins baseball cap), shot me dead before I had even reached their car.

So now, settled in my subconscious is the phobia that unless I get out of the way of some choleric, tetchy, wasp chewing, road owning banker behind me pretty sharpish, I could get shot, which obviously explains the fumbling, the trembling, the quaking and the panic attacks; suffice to say I have been diagnosed with: roadraginghornblastingrightupmybacksideturningrightininmyminiRangeRoverphobia! At 75 letters, try that for size, you hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobics.