Splendid Isolation

It’s an old party game:  “If you could live the life of another person and not your own, whose life would you choose?”

I know, I know:  most people would turn down the choice and want to live their own lives, thank you very much.

And even if they did decide to play, first choices are generally not so good after a little reflection, e.g. “Jesus Christ” (crucified at age 32, after an admittedly-virtuous life), “Errol Flynn” (died of cirrhosis at age 50, after an anything-but-virtuous life), and so on.  Most lives are either noteworthy but short, or else pretty much unremarkable and not worth the substitution.

However, allow me to suggest just one alternative:  Flavio Briatore

Who he, you ask?  Well, under “Bad Boy” in the dictionary you will find this photo:

Allow me to present the salient facts (as I see them) of this man’s extraordinary life.

• failed high school repeatedly;
• started off life as a ski instructor, then a restaurant owner;  and when the latter failed, changed to selling insurance;
• escaped multiple prison terms and bans stemming from “questionable” activities such as fraud, race-fixing and so on;
• during exile from Italy, started a successful string of clothing-store franchises, ending up as CEO of Benetton USA and, by the way, stinking rich as a result;
• was engaged to supermodel Naomi Campbell, then left her for Heidi Klum;
• fathered a child with Heidi, left her and then got her next husband (Seal) to adopt it (ergo  no child support);
• co-owned a British Premier League football team (Queen’s Park Rangers);
• ran two successful Formula 1 racing teams (Benetton and Renault, with all the perks therefrom), and along the way:
• discovered not one but two Formula 1 champion drivers (Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso, FFS);
• is married to Wonderbra model Elisabetta Gregoraci, who is (duh) thirty years his junior;
• lives in Monaco (see details below).

Former Bandmate Knob’s little palais  is near Briatore’s in Monaco, and he contributes these two factoids:

Tell me this isn’t at least a somewhat decent alternative to your life… and now you can scurry off to Wikipedia to get all the details.

Feel free to offer your alternatives in Comments, but they’re better be good to beat this guy.