The origins of Valentine's Day seem to come from the Roman festival Lupercalia. Mars' (God of war, a mean SOB) bastard human sons Remus and Romulus founded the city of Roma, with Romulus killing his brother due to Remus mocking of the low height of the first city walls. Boys will be boys after all. Thusly was Rome built, not in a day as is popularly cited, but by Romulus as a tribute to himself and his fratricide. People were funny about what they celebrated in those days but it turned out to be a good thing. Think, if Remus would have killed Romulus instead he'd have named it Ream instead of Rome, and that would be really strange sounding. Anyway, thus the Lupercalia festival was founded by the surviving brother as a purification and fertility event. A fitting tribute. Then it evolved from naked boys smeared in animal blood to a lover's lottery (much better in my opinion then animal sacrifice), to the church getting involved and morphing the whole thing into little postcards you can give you friends to tell them that yes, once a year, I've thought about you enough to drop a buck on a stupid pink card. The church likes to step in and ruin the party you see. Thank you Travis Dahmen for the history of VDay. :) Forgive my Reader's Digest version of it please.
So here you have Valentine's Day. I'm a married dude, so I try and do a little something to bring a smile to my lover's face on this day. It makes me happy to see her happy naturally, that's what love is all about! More importantly however, the couch downstairs is damn uncomfortable (if you know what I mean.) You play the hand your dealt, and you play to win. So I'm all in. With pocket deuces no less.
However there were many years where I was single on this day, so my interest in recognizing Valentine's Day strangely correlates to my relationship status at the time, as I think it does for most people. After all, if you don't have a father, do you pay attention to Father's Day? If you have kids of course the answer is HELL YES!! Because then you get some attention and free stuff. Very cool. But I digress. The point remains that a person's involvement relates to their relationship status. If you're single, you don't go buy your hand a card after all, that's just weird.
So you have people being mushy with each other, people ignoring it altogether, and then you have the 'progressive' couples that have decided "it's just another day, we love each other every day". Be careful here guys, she may SAY that it's no big deal, but deep down inside, you don't know what kind of emotional soup is simmering. You can take this trump card and play it, but one day you may find that your chip stack is gone. The odds line says, play the hand straight up. Don't take chances. Acknowledge and do something nice, and say that they look great in those jeans. In fact, that ass is SMOKING! I'm just saying, that couch is UNCOMFORTABLE!!
Other thoughts:
Happy Birthday to AJ, a hell of a guy. It was yesterday actually.
I had a successful day yesterday of 'cooking for the in-laws'. For this special occasion I pulled out the big guns, a little recipe in my arsenal called "Cilantro Pesto Mahi-Mahi in Roasted Red Pepper Sauce". With brown rice and cheesy steamed broccoli you can't really go wrong. And by successful I mean no one ran for the bathroom afterwards. Two points for me, yay!
The economy is so bad that I hear the Mafia is laying off judges. I'm just sayin...
Partying with the Captain (Morgan that is) and getting up early on Sunday to hit the gym does seem to be mutually exclusive after all. Those damn commercials LIED!! If you can't trust marketing folks, now who the heck can you trust? Bleh...back to the drawing board.
There was a shooting at the M&M Lounge in Gresham Friday night. An off duty Clackamas sheriff's sergeant shot his wife, two of her female friends, and then himself. In the bar, while the band was playing. Condolences to anyone involved with that sincerely. The world is ugly sometimes, and you don't know who will snap or where it will happen. Treat everyone with respect people, we all have our own problems, struggles, and crosses to bear. Life is too short to give pain and grief. No one wins. The M&M is a place I've played a number of times in the past in different bands, so that shit hits home.
What is up with the Olympic coverage? NBC really needs to lose this to another network that can do it right. We're in the same timezone as the place where this is all going down (Vancouver, BC) and we get tape delayed crap? We only see the USA stuff? The Olympics are global, man! Suck suck suck.
Another cup of Joe, another eventual trip to the gym, and then the honey-do list awaits. Have a great day everyone...
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