StriperAddict
Senior Member
From a very smart yet bruised and battered friend:
____
Subject: A CONCISE HISTORY OF VALENTINE’S DAY
(And useful advice)
Men:
At The Fraternity, we are sticklers for perspective. So, even a widely known occasion such as Valentine’s Day must be seen in its historical context. The roots of the celebration are quite vague, which enables me to get away with less research and fewer verifiable ‘facts,’ which saves a lot of time. Read on.
The Historical Context
Valentine’s Day began as the “Feast of Lupercalia,” a pagan religious celebration of fertility. The feast was held from February 13-15 every year. Various rites of fertility were practiced involving, well, let’s just say events that the women dreaded. (As a cruel irony of history, that view of the day has been reversed so men now generally do the dreading.)
Around 278 A.D., the Roman Emperor, Claudius the Cruel, discovered that legions of men were avoiding military service in order to spend more time with their wives and children. This was making it difficult for Claudius to keep up the fight against the Germanic tribes that were always trying to get across the border into Rome. Emperor Claudius, having a penchant for ‘big government’ solutions, responded by ordering a temporary halt to marriage of draft-age men. Valentine the Priest, who reportedly came up with the phrase ‘make love, not war,’ kept marrying young couples, thereby quenching their zeal to go off and fight the barbarians. When Claudius found out that Valentine was defying him, he had him beheaded. Valentine died on February 14th. Men have been losing their heads over Valentine’s Day ever since.
Around 496 A.D., Pope Gelasius decided that the old feast of Lupercalia had to be replaced by a holiday more closely aligned with the church’s teachings. Gelasius declare Februray 14th to be Saint Valentine’s Day. (Gelasius had also invested heavily in chocolate futures. In his defense, he had promised a tenth of his profits to the church.)
The story does not end there.
A Man Named Joyce
In 1910, Joyce Clyde Hall stepped off the train in Kansas City, Missouri with little money, but filled with the entrepreneurial spirit. At that time, Valentine’s Day was observed much more casually than it is today, and Hall’s plans would dramatically alter that.
Joyce Hall had the brilliant idea to make greeting cards and distribute them nationwide. His company was very successful, and later became known as “Hallmark.” According to documents only recently uncovered, Hall devised the Valentine’s Day card because he hated men and wanted to burden them with a lot of obligations to do things, give things, and say things that none of them knew exactly how to do, give or say. Hall’s condition stemmed from a psychological disorder that developed as a reaction against his father for naming him ‘Joyce.’
Thus ends the concise, but essential history of the ‘celebration’ of Valentine’s Day, which today is fundamentally a modern marketing campaign designed to pick your manly pockets to pay for candy, flowers, an expensive diner, and of course, Valentine’s cards. (OK, call me bitter.)
A Personal History
Growing up, I thought Valentine’s Day was connected to a massacre that occurred in Chicago. A bunch of folks got wacked and I wasn’t sure of the who, what, when, where and why, but they must have had it coming because we got presents, cards and candy to celebrate the occasion. At school we exchanged “Happy Valentines Day” cards with baseball and football players on them and one or two of the moms would bring in cupcakes. We had a party and we missed math; all in all a good deal.
Sometime after squeaking by the 7th grade (a subject for another day), I was informed by one of my smarter classmates that Valentine’s Day was named after some guy from the church in Europe who was a ‘saint’ and went around loving everybody. That didn’t excite my adolescent mind too much, and I have had difficulty with Valentine’s Day ever since.
Practical Tips for Valentine’s Day
I feel your pain. Just the thought of ‘getting it right’ for Valentine’s Day can cause rigor mortis to set in on the best of men. Yet, here are some tips that might help you minimize the suffering:
Buy the right card: Even though the card looks good and has flowers, hearts, pastel colors and all that girly stuff on it, don’t buy it if the greeting is written in Spanish. No, don’t do it even if it is marked down because she will know right away that you got it at Wal-Mart.
Don’t buy her a fire extinguisher. I know, it is red, and it is a good thing to have around in case of a fire, but really, I tried this and the story and the ridicule went viral before there was a viral. Yes, she still married me, but it was a close call and I hear about it every year.
Wrap the present. I know it seems like a waste of time and trees, but the ladies like it if the present is wrapped. I do not know why. This means you cannot simply tape shut the Wal-Mart bag. (A move like that brings out all those Mars/Venus issues.) Pay someone to wrap the present and then loosen the corner and tape it back and she might think you wrapped it yourself. No duct tape.
Do not buy her a set of kitchen knives. Not only is that gift not romantic, but the way most men handle Valentine’s Day makes it imperative that the lady in your life does not have immediate access to sharp objects.
Buy beef jerky and a sleeping bag. These will come in handy when you are forced to retreat to the front porch after your wife or girlfriend starts crying because whatever you bought was the wrong gift which sent the wrong message, which gift and message she did not want to tell you she wanted to receive and hear because she wanted you to think of it yourself, even though if you did think of it yourself you would think and be like her which she does not want either. Make sense?
No it doesn’t, and never will
____
Subject: A CONCISE HISTORY OF VALENTINE’S DAY
(And useful advice)
Men:
At The Fraternity, we are sticklers for perspective. So, even a widely known occasion such as Valentine’s Day must be seen in its historical context. The roots of the celebration are quite vague, which enables me to get away with less research and fewer verifiable ‘facts,’ which saves a lot of time. Read on.
The Historical Context
Valentine’s Day began as the “Feast of Lupercalia,” a pagan religious celebration of fertility. The feast was held from February 13-15 every year. Various rites of fertility were practiced involving, well, let’s just say events that the women dreaded. (As a cruel irony of history, that view of the day has been reversed so men now generally do the dreading.)
Around 278 A.D., the Roman Emperor, Claudius the Cruel, discovered that legions of men were avoiding military service in order to spend more time with their wives and children. This was making it difficult for Claudius to keep up the fight against the Germanic tribes that were always trying to get across the border into Rome. Emperor Claudius, having a penchant for ‘big government’ solutions, responded by ordering a temporary halt to marriage of draft-age men. Valentine the Priest, who reportedly came up with the phrase ‘make love, not war,’ kept marrying young couples, thereby quenching their zeal to go off and fight the barbarians. When Claudius found out that Valentine was defying him, he had him beheaded. Valentine died on February 14th. Men have been losing their heads over Valentine’s Day ever since.
Around 496 A.D., Pope Gelasius decided that the old feast of Lupercalia had to be replaced by a holiday more closely aligned with the church’s teachings. Gelasius declare Februray 14th to be Saint Valentine’s Day. (Gelasius had also invested heavily in chocolate futures. In his defense, he had promised a tenth of his profits to the church.)
The story does not end there.
A Man Named Joyce
In 1910, Joyce Clyde Hall stepped off the train in Kansas City, Missouri with little money, but filled with the entrepreneurial spirit. At that time, Valentine’s Day was observed much more casually than it is today, and Hall’s plans would dramatically alter that.
Joyce Hall had the brilliant idea to make greeting cards and distribute them nationwide. His company was very successful, and later became known as “Hallmark.” According to documents only recently uncovered, Hall devised the Valentine’s Day card because he hated men and wanted to burden them with a lot of obligations to do things, give things, and say things that none of them knew exactly how to do, give or say. Hall’s condition stemmed from a psychological disorder that developed as a reaction against his father for naming him ‘Joyce.’
Thus ends the concise, but essential history of the ‘celebration’ of Valentine’s Day, which today is fundamentally a modern marketing campaign designed to pick your manly pockets to pay for candy, flowers, an expensive diner, and of course, Valentine’s cards. (OK, call me bitter.)
A Personal History
Growing up, I thought Valentine’s Day was connected to a massacre that occurred in Chicago. A bunch of folks got wacked and I wasn’t sure of the who, what, when, where and why, but they must have had it coming because we got presents, cards and candy to celebrate the occasion. At school we exchanged “Happy Valentines Day” cards with baseball and football players on them and one or two of the moms would bring in cupcakes. We had a party and we missed math; all in all a good deal.
Sometime after squeaking by the 7th grade (a subject for another day), I was informed by one of my smarter classmates that Valentine’s Day was named after some guy from the church in Europe who was a ‘saint’ and went around loving everybody. That didn’t excite my adolescent mind too much, and I have had difficulty with Valentine’s Day ever since.
Practical Tips for Valentine’s Day
I feel your pain. Just the thought of ‘getting it right’ for Valentine’s Day can cause rigor mortis to set in on the best of men. Yet, here are some tips that might help you minimize the suffering:
Buy the right card: Even though the card looks good and has flowers, hearts, pastel colors and all that girly stuff on it, don’t buy it if the greeting is written in Spanish. No, don’t do it even if it is marked down because she will know right away that you got it at Wal-Mart.
Don’t buy her a fire extinguisher. I know, it is red, and it is a good thing to have around in case of a fire, but really, I tried this and the story and the ridicule went viral before there was a viral. Yes, she still married me, but it was a close call and I hear about it every year.
Wrap the present. I know it seems like a waste of time and trees, but the ladies like it if the present is wrapped. I do not know why. This means you cannot simply tape shut the Wal-Mart bag. (A move like that brings out all those Mars/Venus issues.) Pay someone to wrap the present and then loosen the corner and tape it back and she might think you wrapped it yourself. No duct tape.
Do not buy her a set of kitchen knives. Not only is that gift not romantic, but the way most men handle Valentine’s Day makes it imperative that the lady in your life does not have immediate access to sharp objects.
Buy beef jerky and a sleeping bag. These will come in handy when you are forced to retreat to the front porch after your wife or girlfriend starts crying because whatever you bought was the wrong gift which sent the wrong message, which gift and message she did not want to tell you she wanted to receive and hear because she wanted you to think of it yourself, even though if you did think of it yourself you would think and be like her which she does not want either. Make sense?
No it doesn’t, and never will
