'People speak only of the hole. It's the only show in town and is our Fungie'

The hole lore is the only topic of conversation now that we can't face talking about since Dublin beat us in the football back in August. Sane Dave tells a fellow customer the drilling they hear is from a dentist who lives next door. It's like The Somme outside the front door. There's a huge trench as deep as a well, with men working day and night.

The Government are bringing natural gas through the town in a big fancy pipe and fixing up the road so that when the job is finished the once lunar-like surface will be as smooth as the top of a cheesecake.

The hole street is called William Street and this is the street where I have spent most of my life ever since I was born here.

People around here are obsessed with potholes. There are about 20,000 votes in potholes, if the last election is anything to go on. Right now the hole is the only show in town. We talk of little else.

How long will it take? How deep will they go? What if they hit rock? Will they find the lost Black and Tans?

People marvel at the diggers with sharp teeth like a great white shark and men in hard hats are treated like superstars.

Business should be really quiet but it's not. Every day people walk up and down the street for a look into the hole. It catches hold of you this looking into holes. So far no one has fallen in.

I was chatting with a few Americans the other day in the pub. Nice people they were but naive.

"What's going on with the road?" they asked.

"This is the hundredth anniversary of the Easter Rising and we're shooting a movie about the wrecking of Dublin back then by the British." I told someone else the movie was to do with 100 years on from The Somme. Well, it was all about gas and trenches.

Those of you who follow the column will recall that a few weeks back we told a visitor yours truly was looking for his wedding ring and the city council were digging like mad to find it.

The hole lore never stops.

The woman who hasn't had sex for 39 years told me in a voice well above the drilling that the foundation of the highway was made up of the bones of dead Black and Tans who were thrown in there during The Troubles for misbehaving.

She then went on to say "soldiers were very randy in general and in private". I have no notion of falling out with the army. It wasn't me who passed the remark. It was the woman who hasn't had sex for 39 years.

She comes down town several times a day for a look at the holes. There's a plastic pipe sticking up like a cobra carried away by flute playing and it's right outside our front door. Ms 39 asks "what's it for?"

I tell her the pipe pumps the Guinness into the pubs. Later on that night this man who lives in Belgium tells us that there are plans to pump beer into the pubs from a two-mile pipeline. In Bruges. I seldom check out a good story in case it turns out not to be true but this one is.

The biggest pipe in the trenches is bringing in natural gas which is great news. There's a great chance of industry. But people speak only of the hole.

A man who was over in England for a while said he heard a story about a gang of Irish lads who promised a man they could connect him up to the gas pipeline on the quiet. Three grand was the cost and he would never have to pay another penny for gas for the rest of his life. He was delighted when the rings of the cooker lit up.

The gas stopped a week later when the Irish gas men had long since disappeared. He had the line checked out and at the end of it was an empty drum of gas. Good enough for him was the consensus.

The man who knows everything is always looking in. He's looking for "ancient artefacts" like the long lost Listowel Cross hidden in the hole by forgetful or killed monks when the Vikings were attacking them.

So far there is no sign of the Listowel Hoard. It's just stones and earth.

This is the first infrastructure project in years. The holes are a novelty and the men who work down the holes and drive the machines are celebrities. They work very hard and I'm beginning to think that what I do isn't really work at all.

The workers work into the night. The street is open for business as the footpaths are grand. Come to Listowel to see the hole and the shops. We have lots of shops, each of which is unique, and brings a different strand to the fabric of the town. Listowel has more independent stores than Dublin, but the hole is our Fungie.

Because the workers are putting in so much effort, the holes are getting filled up pretty quickly, which no doubt will leave some people a little bit disappointed, especially the man who knows everything. He is always coming up with helpful tips about road construction.

He asked me for my opinion on one of his very helpful and interesting suggestions. It was the filling up of the hole with thousands of bouncy balls like the one the kids fling and go ping-ping in all directions. The bouncy balls he said would make for a softer car ride.

We were hemmed in by a large steel structure put there by the road men to make sure people who were looking into the hole didn't fall in. There is no escape.

I was hoping that either the hole would swallow me up or the aliens would come back for me.

Business was quiet on Wednesday. It was just me in the pub. I was beginning to think too much and so I went out for a look at the hole. I stared into the hole and the hole stared back. That's a bad sign. I vowed not to look into the hole. But I couldn't help myself. And there was no sign of the Black and Tans. l Non-hole news: 'The Best of Billy Keane' will be launched in the Shelbourne Hotel in Dublin next Wednesday at 6.30pm. And in the Listowel Arms Hotel next Friday at 8pm.