This weather is good, huh? It’s not even getting dark till 10.30 at night, and I haven’t worn a jumper to work for a month.  That’s a big risk - traveling for half an hour into town without a jumper, but there’s such a small chance of cold or rain I’m taking that risk EVERY FUCKING DAY.

WORDS: ROBERT FOSTER

ILLUSTRATIONS: JESSICA PENFOLD

I really, really love summer.  I want to move to Los Angeles so I can get bored of sun and stay indoors.  I went there once and got so burnt that I looked like the Singing Detective, but it didn’t really dissuade me from staying in the sunlight. I’d like to share a few of my favourite things about summer with you.

SO…in alphabetical order.



AFTERSUN
After a day of punishing yourself in the sun, lathered in low protection sun lotion (anything under 15 is a total waste of money - you know that don’t you, gingers?), the nicest feeling invented by anyone ever is lying in bed on fresh sheets as the sun has gone down, covered in aftersun and watching cartoons on your laptop, your skin stinging and cooling at the same time.

BOATS
I don’t mean super yachts -although I bet that would be amazing- I mean little boats you can hire on lakes in parks and shit.  They’re small, and you can put your feet in the water and take turns rowing and drink beers and drift in the middle of the lake. It’s like Dawson’s Creek but with less complicated and wordy emotions.

CAR RIDES
Windows down, music up, more beers, and four of your buddies shouting and laughing. Riding in cars is like riding in boats but for people who realized Pacey and Dawson were gay for each other.  When I ride in cars in the summer I think about Kiefer Sutherland and his crew in Stand By Me, or the bit in Dazed and Confused when they ride off to get Aerosmith tickets after staying up all night. Which brings us to…

DAZED AND CONFUSED
This is my favourite summer movie - I watch it in the winter to remind me not to kill myself because there will be another July.  I love everything about it; the sweet release of the last day of school, the older kids teaching you stuff about girls, the bit when they smoke weed on the football field, the keg party in the woods - it’s all about being young and doing whatever you want, which is how you should feel in the summer.

EVENING SUNSHINE
On a Friday after work or college, when the weekend is stretching ahead and you find your buddies in the pub, and you can relax and talk about how much you hate work or plan which park you’re going to.

FLYING
I love flying - it’s the coolest fucking thing.  Even though I’m totally scared of it, and get weird butterflies every time the flight attendant goes through the lifejacket/exit routine - I’ve drafted a lot of frantic fear texts to my mum while sitting on planes. But I love watching the wheels leave the ground because I know I’m headed somewhere more summery.  After take off I don’t mind having to go 30’ 000 feet in the air to get somewhere hot, and I fucking love watching the grey city disappear and then seeing a sexy new one arrive. It also never ceases to amaze me that it’s always sunny above the clouds.

GIRLS
I LOVE girls in the summer, I guess I just love girls all the time and then in the summer I just see more of their flesh. Shorts and bikini tops kill me. Plus, I think people in general are in a better mood in the summer and are more willing to make new friends, and that’s when I strike.

HOTELS
Every single hotel room in a first or second world country is going to be cleaner and neater than my flat. I love hotel rooms because the taps are weird and my towels are fresh every day, and the foreign TV channels are weird and confusing.  The best bit is running down the corridors to other people’s rooms - it’s like being at boarding school without the contact sports and minor royals.

JOINTS
In winter I hate weed.  It makes me sick and I get so paranoid I think my mother’s try to kill me. But on a sunny day, maybe in a hammock or on the boat I was talking about earlier, it gets you all blissed out and smiley, and you’ll feel like you’re in a road movie.

KICKABOUTS
Let’s make this clear: I fucking hate football, it bores me senseless and being desperately bad at it was the reason I was so deeply unpopular at school, but in the summer, in the park, with other malco-ordinates, as long as there’s no tackling or actual rules, I enjoy kicking a ball around. It feels good with bare feet and it gets me moving, it’s funny when you’re drunk and I’m usually better than at least one of the girls in any group I’m in.

LONG DAYS
Isn’t it great that dawn is at 4am in the summer? When you’re walking home with friends after a night out as the sun comes up it gives everything a bittersweet twinge, and you want to hug everyone you’re with and get in the car and get Aerosmith tickets. Or keep drinking.

MINTED LAMB
Barbeques are one of my favourite things, but I thought boats were more important to flag up on this list, as they’re a less obvious choice. Minted Lamb is my barbeque favourite, it’s reasonably priced and it is a million times more flavour-some than sausages.  It goes real well with salad or in a roll, you don’t have to use sauce (the mint is quite potent), and you can eat it with your hands. The key to good barbeque meat is versatility, and Minted Lamb is so versatile it’s basically steak.

NO JACKETS
Jackets are boring, and you always end up wearing the same jacket all winter because, well, who has more than one jacket on the go? The sad tragedy of that is you end up looking pretty much the same all winter. In summer you can go out in just a T-shirt, so you can mix it up and look more interesting and varied. Also, you don’t have to deal with coat checks at clubs and panic about which chair you left it on at the end of the night.

ORANGE CALIPPOS
You know that bit in Anchorman when he goes “milk was a bad choice”? That’s how I feel about ice cream.  It’s too much, especially on a stomach full of Spanish beer, and I always imagine it curdling and get the dairy sweats. The smart choice for the modern chap on the move is an Orange Calippo - it’s refreshing, it doesn’t drip and you can pretend to give someone a blowjob when you’re sucking it.

PARKS
Going to the park is like going to the beach in the city, in fact it’s like going camping for a day without the sweaty tents or the lack of showers, which is kind of what happens when you go to the beach. I like how you build a little camp of rugs and then just hang out, and eat, drink, talk, and try each other’s bikes out. It’s annoying when you have to go to the bathroom though - at the beach you can just pretend you’re going for a short swim, but in a park it’s always a fucking long walk.

QUALITY TELEVISION
Ok, this one is kind of not true at all - Big Brother is played out bullshit for morons and tabloids with space to fill, and the only alternative is reruns or fucking Wimbledon. The point of Television in the summer is to force you out of the house, and into the great outdoors to see your friends face to face.  Not just via facebook chat on the laptop that’s rested on your chest as you languish in your own filth on the sofa.  Which is your life the rest of the year.

RAIN
It feels great getting caught in the rain and running home.  Haven’t you seen Four Weddings And A Funeral? It also feels great on sunburn and gives you an excuse to stay indoors and watch TV.  Sometimes relentless sunshine can mean you feel guilty for watching Family Guy all day with the curtains shut.

SHORTS
I have absolutely no idea why people get weird about shorts.  Shorts represent freedom. I would never work a job where you weren’t allowed to wear shorts in the summer. If the boss is in charge of your lower extremities, then he’s in charge of too much of your life.

TIRE SWINGS
I’ve probably only been on one of these about twice in my entire life, but I’m pretty sure those times add up to my most idyllic summer moments. A tire swing over a river, in a secluded area of the countryside, with just your buddies and not a care in the world? I cannot think of anything better.

UNEMPLOYMENT
I’ve been unemployed in the winter and in the summer, and I can tell you the summer is far preferable. It’s almost definitely worth spending half an hour in the job centre with men with facial scars and people who don’t take their hoods off when they’re being interviewed, when you know you can just head off with your sixty pounds for the week and spend it all on Coronas for the park.

VINTAGE SUMMER DRESSES
Do you think boys like girls in these dresses because they remind them of photos of their mums from the seventies? Maybe.  Possibly. There’s something about any girl who wears them (well, within reason… sorry) that makes them look like a vision of summer, and me quite ready to marry them and give them beautiful blond children.

WHY?
Why? are a band from America, they’ve been described variously as ‘emo rap’ and ‘folk hop’, which sounds absolutely fucking awful. I stumbled across them working at a not terribly popular music magazine a few years ago, and I KNOW they’re corny and overwrought, and I KNOW they’re probably super smug about combining rap with live instruments and that their songs are about longing and lame shit like that.  But in the summer they’re ALL I want to listen to - it’s really embarrassing.  In the summer it’s OK to like bad music, because sometimes it just fits.

XTRA PROTECTION
I am ginger. It’s tough, because I love the sunlight, and I like the idea of having a healthy glow (also I got a hard time at school). I always think that if I go out in the sun and really pound it for a day or two I’ll go red but it’ll progress into a lovely base tan. It never ever does. So I have to wear factor 50, minimum for the rest of the year. It sucks, but the smell reminds me of good times, and I really needed an X for this list.

YOUTHFUL EXUBERANCE
In the winter I’m about as playful as a really serious guy talking about his father dying a slow and painful death due to an obscure terminal illness, but in the summer I’m going to throw you in the pool, take off my shoes in the park and steal your towel at the beach. I’m fun in the summer.

ZZZ…
Sleeping in the sun is the fucking best, either in the dappled shade or the actual sunlight (burn city, but totally worth it). The best bit is just as you’re drifting off and everything’s serene and warm.
Fuck.  I’m starting to get panic attacks thinking about how winter is going to come back.