IMAGINE the embarrassment when she realised…. The woman who joined her own search party when she apparently went missing from a bus trip takes some beating doesn’t it?

According to news reports (and no, it’s not April 1 just yet) she was in Iceland as part of a tour group when the bus stopped and she stepped away to freshen up and change her clothes.

They didn’t recognise her when she got back on the bus, reported her missing, and she then joined in the subsequent search for herself without recognising her own description.

But what did she say when finally, hours later, the light bulb finally came on? Did she just brazen it out and say “yoo-hoo, I’ve found me”?

Or did she sidle up to the search leaders and whisper to them out of the side of her mouth “ahem – I think it’s me you’re looking for”?

Her story brings to mind those countless ignominious moments in life when you fervently wish the ground could swallow you up.

And just think – given those sink holes we’ve been hearing about around Ripon, the city could become the destination of choice for anyone with a mortifyingly red face of embarrassment.

You know the kind of thing – walking back from the loo in a crowded bar with your dress tucked in your knickers.

When you’re trying to be cool at school then calling your teacher ‘mum’ in front of the whole class.

Forgetting the name of the person you’re talking to when they clearly know yours and everything about you.

Tripping over the kerb in a crowded street and going bum over apex.

Realising you’ve got huge sweat patches under your arms or you’re ponging a bit in the heat.

Then there’s smiling winningly at someone you want to impress only realising later that you’ve got spinach stuck in your teeth.

Breezing up to someone with a big friendly ‘hi, how are you?’ before it dawns on you that you’re talking to a stranger.

Waving madly at someone you think is waving to you when they’re not.

Losing your car in the car park and wandering forlornly up and down the rows looking for it while being stared at by others who probably think you’re a car thief.

Splatting your lunch on your top then walking round with arms crossed to hide it, or if you manage to keep your lunch off your jumper, choking on it instead.

That awkward moment when you’re having a moan about someone to your mates then realise the subject of your vitriol is standing right behind you.

Having a rant about the phone conversation you’ve just had thinking you’ve hung up on the person who’s annoyed you then realising you haven’t.

Sitting on the loo in trap one, minding your own business, when someone walks in on you. Being pulled by the police and being mortified, not only for doing whatever it was that got you pulled in the first place, but because passing motorists are rubber-necking your misfortune.

And there’s always that one about breaking wind in polite company and pretending it’s not you.

I once worked with a woman who was uber-sophisticated, always well-dressed and the sort of person who could make anything look good.

She was professionally very successful and while not quite in the devil-wears-Prada league we were all a bit scared of her. But one day we got her to the pub and managed to get her to let her hair down enough (literally and metaphorically) to tell us about The Day She Lost Her Knickers.

She was purposefully click-clacking along a crowded street in her high heels, brief case in one hand, smart handbag slung over her shoulder, when she felt herself come adrift.

Or rather, her knickers did. Slowly but surely they were working their way down underneath her skirt, the elastic well and truly twanged and no amount of surreptitious hitching was going to stop their slide south.

She was nowhere near a handy café or bar that she could dive in to rescue her dignity so there was only thing for it.

She stopped, put down her briefcase, hitched up her skirt, pulled down the defective drawers, stepped delicately out of them one foot after the other and stuffed them in her handbag before proceeding on her way. Now that’s what I call class.

As for me revealing my most embarrassing moments? No chance – the editor would never let me write a column for this newspaper again. Wild horses wouldn’t drag them out of me. There again, a large quaff of wine might.