Alpine wild boar play at chicken

If you are ever reincarnated as a wild boar, draw the short straw and end up in France, then you might find yourself with a stiff neck from constantly looking over your shoulder.

Your average life expectancy of 27 years could be seriously curtailed by a number of Gallic-born malicious factors. Suffice to say, as one of nature's loner's, you'll soon find yourself in need of a few friends. Problem is, you might just find them hard to come by.

Before you've even destroyed your first vedgetable patch and earnt yourself a no-nonsense enemy in the process, you should already be on the lookout for 1.4 million armed Frenchmen, patrolling your favourite habitat and dreaming of a hearty feast (the best bits of you) or a smashing trophy for the mother-in-law's front room (your head - sorry). One consolation - the law gives you the summer off being shot at, so feel free to paint humourous targets on your back during this period to taunt the local chasseurs.

As if all that wasn't bad enough, you've not exactly got your trotter on the health and safety pulse. Take for example, one of your new brothers, who, according to today's Dauphiné Libéré, calmly crossed the A41 motorway near Annecy - miraculously escaping a certain death and gladly not causing any injury to passing motorists, in what was quite possibly a thwarted suicide attempt.

So, if you want my advice, if you do come back as a French wild boar, go to an internet café, log on to the Office National de la Chasse et de la Faune Sauvage website, check out the precise date of the start of the hunting season (sometime in mid-September) and buy yourself a cunning disguise of any animal that might feature on the 'un-chasse-able due to low numbers' list.

And finally, on a more serious note, driving at full pelt into a 30 stone (and the rest) animal with no capacity to pull off a swift evasive manoevre can of course be extremely dangerous.