A few months ago I wrote about the man who resigned from his job on the Enterprise train to Belfast. It was part rant about the kind of conversations people have in public on their mobile phones and part astonishment at how quickly the whole fabric of Irish life had changed - it's far from resigning from jobs on our mobile phones that many of us were reared!

That particular journey was marred by the consistent peal of the William Tell Overture as businessmen took their calls and then had long conversations about the fact that we were passing Howth Junction. However, on my most recent trip northwards the miscellaneous music from my fellow-passengers' phones was a lot less frequent. I thought perhaps it might have had something to do with the fact that I was on the 7.40 a.m. train and most travellers were more concerned with getting in a spot of breakfast than taking phone calls, but things were equally quiet on the afternoon return journey.

In fact, the return journey consisted of people tapping like crazy on their laptops instead of nattering on the phone. I often fit this profile myself, since I find the train a great way to catch up on stuff that I never make time to do at home, but on this occasion I was gently leafing through my Irish Times and thinking evil thoughts about the Crosaire rather than doing anything more constructive.

Anyway, I was sadly mistaken in thinking that the rest of carriage was a hotbed of corporate activity while I was the sole time-waster. As I went for a gentle stroll to free up the little grey cells (seven down being particularly fiendish that day), I noticed that the two guys who were tapping the most furiously and who had expressions of intense concentration on their faces were actually playing solitaire.

Given that hordes of people play solitaire on their office computers anyway, I suppose things weren't all that different on the mobile office that was the Enterprise. And I was kind of glad to realise that I wasn't the only one who didn't feel like doing anything too strenuous that afternoon.

But is this a sign of a slowdown in the Irish economy? No manic phone calls, no job offers and nobody cursing under their breath about the fact that the computer program has unexpectedly quit? The train was full, so there's still plenty of corporate travelling to be done but is the fact that it's being done in silence a sign that we've moved onto a different level of economic activity? A slower level of economic activity? One in which there's no need for us to be in constant contact with the office?

Or perhaps all those people who chattered on the phone were employed in the technology sector and now they're all at home playing solitaire too. The US unemployment figures last week, showing an eight-year high in jobless claims, mean that there are certainly plenty of Americans with time on their hands. I don't want to seem overly pessimistic and I know that greater minds than mine (Wim Duisenberg's, for example) believe that Europe can emerge unscathed from whatever downturns may exist, but the train may yet be telling a different story.

Measures are still being taken on the Dublin-Belfast line to protect the Republic from foot-and-mouth, although, unlike the last time I travelled, the outside of the train wasn't disinfected before we crossed the border. This time, however, besides the usual disinfected mats we were offered leaflets about the necessity to dryclean every stitch of clothes if we'd been near farms. Strangely, these leaflets weren't handed out a few weeks before when I'd have thought they'd have been most appropriate. They are, of course, irrelevant to me since I usually obtain my milk in cartons and what little beef I eat comes in a small box with microwave instructions printed on the side, so the chances of me setting foot on a farm are pretty slim.

I have, in fact, been letting the train take the strain quite a lot over the past month as I've been meeting people in the Irish book trade. Travelling by train means that I arrive at my destination feeling more relaxed than if I had to drive (I'm not what you'd call a patient driver) and so I've been very bullish on the whole Iarnrod Eireann network as I criss-crossed the country. The bullishness lasted until I got the train home from Galway.

Although I'm an egalitarian girl by nature I've found that travelling first class or super standard does mean extra room and a slightly more comfortable seat. Not exactly earth-shattering but nice if you're going to or coming from a meeting and you want to chill out a bit. Also, people don't mind you doing the tap-tap thing on the laptop either - it's almost obligatory if you're sitting with the suits. So I was lulled into thinking that the train was the only way to travel until the Galway trip.

The outward journey was okay but the return - words actually fail me at how awful it was. There was no first-class or super-standard compartment on the train, which was fine by me. However, we were made to travel in something that had obviously been rescued from the nearest skip.

The whole thing reeked of very stale cigarette smoke, the lights flickered irritatingly, the windows were too grimy to see through and the seats were circa 1950. And the worst thing from my point of view was that I actually wanted to work on the journey.

But the idea of taking out my computer and putting it on the so-called table in front of me was scary. So it'll be the car to Galway in future while reserving the train for Belfast and Cork.

The cross-country travelling has stopped for the time being, which means I'm back at my desk again. But it's hard to get my head around what I'm meant to be doing. I have a solitaire program on my computer too.

If it's good enough for the guys on the Enterprise, it's good enough for me. Maybe it's just an early summer productivity glitch.