Almost Valentine's Day...

Valentine's day is a darned joke.

Up until he late sixties the Catholic Church recognized almost a dozen different Valentine's Days, named so after Christian martyrs. Our current Valentine's Day comes from two of them named Valentine and is supposed to be a saints day commemorating Saint Valentine.

During the time of that dirty old man Geoffrey Chaucer the day became associated wit romantic love.

During the 1800s handwritten notes to our 'valentine' started giving way to mass produced greeting cards. The commercialization of Valentine's Day led the way to the further commercialization of holidays. It's the time to buy greeting cards, red lingerie such as bustiers and tons of flowers.

Not that I am a complete Scrooge about the holidays or anything, but personally I would prefer the wife to just write me a note or something rather than go out an buy junk that will just get stuck in a drawer somewhere.

This year is a bit different though. I start my vacation on Valentine's Day. Since I don't know what things are going to be like in June as far as extra money goes, or my work hours, we are celebrating our 20th anniversary a bit early and going to the Bahamas on the 15th. I would have gotten tickets a day earlier but it would have been much more difficult for her to take an extra day off work, not to mention the fact that we had to find childcare for the girls as well.