The 5 Best (And 5 Worst) Aspects Of Fall, According To Dads

September 11, 2018

5th Best: Leaves Changing Colors

Fall is truly a beautiful part of the year, and nothing exemplifies that more than the kaleidoscopic swirls of color that come right before the leaves fall for the season. The splattering of red, yellow and orange make the season truly picturesque.

5th Worst: Having To Rake Said Leaves

But once you get to look at the pretty colors, they shrivel up, die, and end up on your damn lawn. Leaves become a menace by the middle of October, and every time you clear the lawn of the leaves (and make a massive pile in the street that cars keep ramming into) about a metric ton of leaves decide to drift back onto your lawn. It’s a never-ending nightmare.

4th Best: Sneaking Candy Meant For Trick-Or-Treaters On Halloween

For as long as dads have had to greet trick-or-treaters, they have learned that one of the perks of the gig is relatively unrestricted access to candy. Every household buys enough candy to feed every child in town three times over, so snagging a fun-sized Snickers here and there is the perfect crime.

4th Worst: Getting Egged/Having Pumpkins Smashed On Halloween

That said, teenagers turn into punks on Halloween. There’s a fair chance your house will be egged, or at the very least someone will go ham on the pumpkin you so meticulously carved the week before.

3rd Best: Cool, Crisp Afternoons Outside

There’s nothing like laying on the hammock during one of those sunny 60-degree days reading a book or sipping a beer.

3rd Worst: Earlier Nights And Shorter Days

But the moment you walk out of the office and the sun has already gone down is truly the most depressing day of the year.

2nd Best: Kids Go Off To School

When the kids go off to school, you have so much more freedom! Between homework and extracurricular activities, the school year offers dads everywhere hundreds of precious moments of solitude.

2nd Worst: Taking Kids Back-To-School Shopping

There is no solitude when you’re dragging your three kids through a Target trying to find just the right school supplies. Making matters worse, dads almost inevitably wait till the last minute to start back-to-school shopping, and find themselves in immediate and direct competition with every other dad who waited until the last minute. Never has buying a pack of pens had higher stakes.

Best: Autumn Food And Thanksgiving

The food of fall is the best, leading up to Thanksgiving, which is the best holiday as far as dads are concerned. Everything is warming and comforting. And it’s apple picking season. Dads love apple picking so much they’ll even miss a Sunday of football for it, which is a crazy thing to think about.

Worst: Pumpkin Spice

But with the great foods of fall come the bane of a dad’s existence. Pumpkin Spice Latte season. Nothing makes a dad angrier than pumpkin spice. Nothing. It is, for them, the worst thing about fall. But their favorite thing to complain about.