You know what’s the worst thing about Irish summers? No, not the fact that they don’t exist except in the most theoretical way.
We’re talking about that pompous eejit who rears his head every year on our beaches: Sandcastle Project Management Dad (SPMD). He can’t just let the nippers mess away and throw up some yoke that looks like a plate of half-set jelly left beside a radiator for five hours.
No, this hero must take full control of the “build”, as if leading a major public works project, instead of just spending time with his kids while discreetly ogling 19-year-olds in teeny bikinis.
SPMD has to organise the whole thing, measure the dimensions, make it perfect. You half-expect him to suggest buttressing a supporting wall with some Loop-the-Loop sticks, or apply for planning on an interior moat with bucket-shaped turrets.
Then he loses his temper when the toddler crushes part of it and shoos the children far away, as they are “jeopardising the project’s viability”.
A true menace on Irish beaches, only matched by those idiots who refuse to pull their poodle back when it’s clearly terrifying a child, homoerotic gym buddies doing tandem sit-ups, weirdoes having picnics even though there’s a hurricane blowing sand into the sandwiches, German men wearing tiny trunks…
Oh, we’re better off not having much of a summer.
Darragh McManus, author and journalist 
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