Over dinner with my new colleagues last night the story of my accident gradually unfolded.

As the (male) colleague sitting to my right learnt about my artificial leg I saw a look of relief break out across his face.

"I was getting really nervous," he said, "because you kept rubbing your leg up against mine and I thought you were coming on to me."

I insisted my real leg had been completely oblivious to the messages the artificial one had been sending out all evening.