WITH MY name, I have more than once been taken to be French. That is, until I speak and the Bradford vowels come tumbling from my lips, or I stand up and display the less than Gallic gracefulness of my carriage.

Part of me hates having to put people right; in fact, part of me would really rather like to be French.

It would be fabulous to have that innate elegance, that perfect poise, and that ability to put you in your place with a single, eloquent shrug.

Then, of course, there’s the Cote d’Azur, Provence and Paris; there’s Burgundy, Champagne and Bordeaux. Who wouldn’t want them as their birthright?

Maybe it’s the envy of such things that has had the English at daggers drawn with the Old Enemy for centuries. In any event, there’s now another reason for us to hate the French: they get nine hours sleep a night.

According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, that’s a good half an hour more than the bleary-eyed Brits, and more than an hour more than the Koreans and Japanese. And the OECD ought to be able to work it out – it’s based in Paris, so its workers have had a decent night’s kip.

Furthermore, when the French do rise from their slumbers, they spend more time eating and drinking than the rest of the world: they take two hours a day over food, 30 minutes longer than we do and an hour longer than a Mexican.

No wonder the French look and feel so superior; they haven’t been lying awake wondering if time has stopped for eternity at 03.17am, and they haven’t got indigestion from a nasty white-bread sandwich eaten hunched over a computer. • STILL, things could be worse. I could have been born Chinese, in which case I would never have managed to kick the evil weed. It took decades for me to pack in smoking, but I eventually managed it in 2004. In parts of China, they’ve just made it compulsory.

Officials in Hubei Province, central China, have threatened officials with fines if they fail to get through their target of gaspers. Even teachers have been given a smoking quota in an attempt to boost the local economy. And woe betide anyone who doesn’t smoke the officially approved local brand.

A taskforce of ashtray inspectors has been set up and one teacher has already been given an official warning after being caught in possession of a tab end belonging to a rival cigarette brand.

The Chinese are missing a trick here. With smokers being practically outlawed across Europe, and holidaymakers seeking alternative destinations to make their weakened pound go further, there has to be a tourism opportunity. You wouldn’t need to spend thousands on moody shots of the landscape to drum up trade. Just say smoking is the law and you’ll be coining it in.

• SO, THE Holy Grail of family planning is within our grasp, with the arrival of a male contraceptive jab. It’s allegedly just as effective as the Pill, and you wouldn’t have to remember to take it every day.

Less worrying than a male Pill, then, from a female point of view; but any sensible woman would still want to see the jab site branded with proof of injection and legible expiry date.

Best of all, the jab is basically testosterone, so blokes who took it could feel extra butch.

Hang on a minute, though. Isn’t too much testosterone supposed to lead to hair loss? Or is that just what they say to the follically challenged?