Father’s Day

No man ever watched a £20 note flutter from an opened Father’s Day card and thought: ‘How disappointing — not enough thought has gone into that.’ If you’re a son, you’ll know this already. But if you’re a daughter, remember that the sexes are different. Women want presents, actual objects, things that show your loved one has gone to the trouble of visiting a shop and making a choice, no matter how ill-advised and instantly destined for Oxfam. But men are a different country: we do things differently here.

For a start, many men don’t want any more possessions, full stop. One of the experiences nudging them in that direction is fatherhood itself: seeing a child grow up is a reminder of just how much crap life can generate (I swear the toys in a six-year-old’s bedroom breed). A man reaches an age when ‘you can’t take it with you’ really hits home, when he wants the rest of his life to be filled with experiences rather than stuff.