I’m not sure what triggers it. It’s not related to age; I didn’t become a dad until my late thirties, so the Dad Things didn’t kick in until fairly recently, but guys who become fathers in their twenties or earlier start displaying dad traits much sooner.

It’s also not related to the presence of the child itself. I’m not talking about building go-karts or oiling bike chains, I’m talking about things that dads do that don’t require the presence of a child at all. You can do all these things without being a dad, it just that people tend not to.

Some examples:

Eating dull cereal
I used to enjoy a crunchy nut cornflake or two, a hearty bowl of fruit and fibre, maybe some Cheerios when I was feeling extravagant.

These are not Dad Cereals. Dads take perverse pleasure in eating as dull and worthy a breakfast cereal as possible. The moment I became a father I began to shun the frivilous end of the cereal aisle and hanker for good old cornflakes with a bit of milk. Even All Bran is looking a bit la-di-dah for me these days. By next year I think I’ll be eating a cereal that looks and tastes somewhat like the wood chips you buy in garden centres.

Sucking on lemons
Jane pointed this one out to me. I’d reached the bottom of a glass of coke, fished out the slice of lemon and began sucking on it and pulling faces.

“My dad used to do that!” she said, and we realised it was another Dad Thing. Actually, the proper Dad Thing is sucking on a lemon slice and pretending to like it, but I’m not quite at that stage yet. Perhaps this dad gene is expressed early to give the father time to master the skill by the time their offspring is old enough to appreciate it.

(This is another important aspect of all Dad Things, although they don’t require the presence of your progeny, they’re only really satisfying when performed in front of them.)

Making stuff up
It’s a dad’s duty to fill his children’s brains with endless misinformation, to prepare them for a lifetime of being lied to by everyone else. When they reach an age where they triumphantly cry “no it isn’t Daddy!” to some patent nonsense you’ve just spouted, you can feel satisfied of a job well done.

Actually Jane will probably argue that I’ve always been good at making stuff up, but the presence of Tom has kicked this part of my personality into overdrive. I spent a good half hour last night telling my son how cushions like the one he was propped up on were hunted and culled in glacial Iceland.

I can’t wait until he actually understands what I’m saying so I can start telling him some real whoppers.