Savour the scent of summer while you can — for it won’t linger long

It was Andy Williams who first recorded the song about Christmas, claiming that “it’s the most wonderful time of the year”, but then the GAA and its unique fascinations probably weren’t all that big a deal around Wall Lake, Iowa where the famous old crooner was born.

For those of us more in tune with the particular delights of Gaelic football and hurling, there is surely no more wondrous segment of the calendar than these few weeks in May between the league’s finale and the opening rounds of the championship.

It doesn’t matter how often our own lot disappoint, the championship stands unblemished in the mind’s eye, like those idealised childhood summers when the rain never fell and boredom with it. The difference is, of course, that we still get to feel those same childlike flutters as the years fly by.