Revealed, those everyday things that drive us mad

BRITONS once prided themselves on staying calm in the face of adversity. Now we seem to fly off the handle almost the moment something goes wrong, research suggests.

The one thing that makes us go off the deep end faster than anything else is finding a ‘sorry we missed you’ note by the front door from a delivery driver.

That infuriates us in less than six minutes. Going without a phone signal presses our buttons after only seven minutes, as do those who talk and rustle sweet wrappers in the cinema.

We are comparatively tolerant of annoying colleagues who make our blood boil after 11 minutes, the study of 2,000 people shows, and we can endure about 13 minutes of waiting for our partners to get ready. The research by broad- bandchoices.co.uk revealed the average Briton goes off the deep end once every two weeks, with 68 per cent of respondents admitting they have a ‘short fuse’. Company spokesman Mark Pocock said: ‘We are now used to having everything at our fingertips. Technology has made accessing services quicker, from banking online to shopping on your mobile with deliveries the same day. Alongside this though, as a nation, our expectations have shortened, and our high expectations have made us more impatient.’

Despite the conveniences of modern life many of us still can’t take a deep breath and count to ten. For 42 per cent of us admit to having sworn at an inanimate object in the last year and 20 per cent have stormed out of the house and slammed a door. A similar percentage have abandoned our shopping and walked out of a store and an irate 3 per cent have acted like Basil Fawlty and attacked their own car.

Leicester seems to be the rage capital of the nation, with 20 per cent admitting to having a ‘very short fuse’. In contrast, Plymouth is Britain’s most laid-back city with 37 per cent of people there claiming to be ‘extremely patient’.