Happy Love Day Everyone
or:
Something Like Love Day, But Not Quite So Lame
or:
Annual VD Rant, One Day Late, One Day Late
or:
This One's for Aa

I was thinking about letting the date slide without comment this year until Aa instigated all this...

So the other day we have what passes for a big ice storm hereabouts and I end up over t' the Wal-Mart (or Wal-Mark's as they say back home) to buy some rock salt. (Yes, yes, I know I'm a Bad Liberal for buying stuff there...but I try not to do it very often.) And there's, like, this frenzy in the middle of the store in the middle of the day and I'm all like WTF??? and proceed to wend my way through this crush of people when I notice that they're all waving around either those cellophane cones full of flowers or one of those big red hearts full of candy, and so I thinks to myself I thinks--using my Philosophy Powers--it must be VD.

Now, I happened to be talking to Johnny Quest on the phone at the time, so I allow as how it must be VD...and she says: "You know what that means!"

And the thing is, I did: half price candy coming up!

See, now that's the kind of girlfriend I have: hot, interesting, ridiculously smart, knows a lot of philosophy, thinks VD is the lamest holiday ever, and appreciates the finer things in life...

So it would be churlish of me, would it not, to rub the noses of others in it by making fun of folks whose GFs make them do the whole frilly hearts thing?

Yes. Yes it would.

Which does not mean that I will not do so.

See, my theory is as follows: people have every right to enjoy a lame-ass quasi-holiday...but the rest of us have every right to make fun of them for it.

As far as I'm concerned, no putative holiday counts if it doesn't involve at least one of the following:

1. Excessive amounts of food, including especially gravy

2. Presents

3. Fireworks

4. Scantily-clad females

5. Ghost stories

6. Excessive amounts of alcohol.

I feel kind of bad about 4, since it seems sexist...but it isn't because I have no in principle objection to scantily-clad males, it's just that, well, nobody wants to see that. It's just the way it is. I don't make up the rules, people.

Incidentally: extra points for mixing themes (e.g. alcohol and ghost stories, alcohol and scantily-clad females, scantily-clad females and fireworks, scantily-clad females and presents, scantily-clad females and gravy...there are whole new realms of holiday technology that are still unexplored...)

Incidentally, at what point did Halloween transmogrify into an excuse for females to dress slutty? And by 'slutty' I mean: excellent. I'm not complaining, of course, I'm just wondering. (And, incidentally, 'slut' and 'slutty' were not terms allowed into my usual lexicon until I realized that most of the females I know use the terms in a tongue-in-cheekish sort of way such that they're funny and not insulting.)

So see how superior Halloween is, holiday-wise, to Valentine's Day? It's, like, no comparison.

Now I know that our female readers (both of them) are currently thinking: A redneck and a nerd? A smart-ass and cheap? Shops at Wal-Mart and ignores V-day? Possible sexist and buys cheap-ass rock salt instead of hight-tech Prestone ice-melting pellets? Where can I get a boyfriend like that Winston Smith?

To them I say: hey, I told you I don't shop at Wal-Mart that much jeez try to keep up.

So, to review:

(I) VD sucks.

(II) I don't have to celebrate it.

(III) Ha ha ha.

Although VD seems to have thus far survived my scathing criticisms and the vast influence of my blog, I still look forward to a time when we can declare VVDD--Victory over Valentine's Day Day.

Until then: viva la resistance!