"[Don’t] Bring me sunshine..."

Being fair-skinned, the imminent arrival of the summer sees myself and my fellow pasty-faced compadres pelting for the nearest shade where we’ll spend the next few months quivering in abject terror. To commemorate this particularly painful time of year, here are my personal sunburn top three:

1. Swimming pool in South Africa, aged eleven – lying face down on 6,000 degree concrete and baring the backs of my shins to a scorching sky for an entire afternoon. The pain for the ensuing week was indescribable and I carry the resulting freckle patches, resembling twin explosions in a baked bean factory, to this day. Me and my mate Gary were unable to walk properly for days.

2. Holibobs in Tenerife, aged 25 – displaying trademark British grit and ignorance, we stripped down to our shorts and headed for the beach, sans sun cream, within an hour of descending the plane’s steps into a Canarian furnace. The administering of factor 30 to a crispy “singing detective” style torso which looked like the surface of a McDonalds apple pie the following day was accompanied with an audible sizzling sound. It was fine unless you wanted to talk. Or smile. Or move.

3. Snowboarding in Andorra, aged 26 – foolishly believing you couldn’t get sunburnt in single figure temperatures (when actually the thin atmosphere, complete lack of cloud cover and reflective glare from the whited-out landscape meant the opposite was abundantly true), I spent a whole day on the slopes with my poorly-thatched cranium being cooked by ultra-violet rays. Over the next week, the resulting scabs which filled my hat resembled a bowl of cornflakes in both appearance and volume. Sleep was only possible if you propped the pillow under your neck and exhibited as much animation as Stephen Hawking with narcolepsy.

It’s going to be a scorcher this year? Oh happy day...