Valentine's Day, brought to you by People Who Sell Red Things!

Now, I know there are plenty of you out there who don't know where Valentine's Day comes from. You are just vaguely aware that if you don't do what Hallmark tells you, you're somehow not fully human. Oh, and buy candy.

Personally, I ditched the whole, "this is what everybody's doing today," business in about 8th grade. But in honor of the holiday, I felt that this year I should give you a little history lesson about Saint Valentine. This way, you can feel like you're really celebrating something important.

Valentine's Day is in honor of Saint Valentine, a catholic priest who lived in about 300 A.D. I saw a website that said he lived in,

"...the year 300. It was either A.D. or B.C. I can't remember which."

Ok, first of all, why type that sentence? Just look it up, and then create your website. Secondly, if he's a Catholic priest, let's see if we can puzzle out which one it was. Hmm...Catholics were pretty few and far between 300 years before the birth of Christ, wouldn't you guess? Only the most progressive of priests were in the game at that point. "Look, he'll be here, ok? Don't worry about it. Now, eat this bread and tell me you're sorry for stuff and nevermind why!"

Anyway, the Roman emperor at the time had outlawed marriage (take that you nancy-pants "no gay marriage" people. This guy went after all marriage. How do your moral values feel now? Pretty sissy, huh? Yeah, thought so.) Saint Valentine married people anyway. He was caught and, in accordance with the custom of the day, beaten to death with clubs. (Hey, when in Rome, right?)

Now, when you think of beating a priest to death with clubs, you can see what an easy transition it must have been to the part where 5 year olds are giving each other candy and sending cards that say things that they couldn't possibly understand to other 5 year olds that they barely know.

Come to think of it, I don't even understand these cards. "Be my Valentine?" What do you want from me? Are you asking me to get beaten to death in accordance with Roman law? Because if so, uh...no. No thank you, indeed.