WHAT'S the big Valentine's Day plan, then? Well, there's Option A (aka the full shebang): Wine and dine your beloved with a home-cooked meal, buy them chocolates, flowers, soppy card, a little teddy bear clutching a padded heart. Netflix and chill.
Then there is Option B (aka the sensible choice): neatly sidestep the gauche commercialisation of it all and enjoy an ordinary Sunday. Tea and toast with the papers. A nice walk. Roast dinner. I know what I will be doing.
If you require any further persuasion that it is Option B all the way, here's a greatest hits of my favourite Valentine's Day disasters.
The "gold" necklace
I was a teenager and my then-boyfriend presented me with a velvet box in the manner of Richard Gere wooing Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, which was meant to be cute, but he almost took my fingers off when the lid slammed shut. It was like a Venus fly trap with the force of a piranha's jaws.
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What soon became clear was that said necklace was not real gold. My neck very quickly took on a green hue. Maybe I scrubbed too hard to remove the stain. Perhaps it was terrible timing that my allergy to cheap metals chose to rear its head.
The necklace left searing raw welts and scabby eczema that looked like I'd been garrotted. I had to wear a polo neck for a week.
A&E mayhem
It is never nice to spend an evening in A&E with a suspected blood clot, but it is especially rubbish to do so on Valentine's Day. Even if your fellow patients are putting on a cabaret show worthy of the Grand Guignol in Paris.
Such as the man who had sliced the top off his finger while cooking a surprise dinner for his wife, or the slew of clumsy Casanovas with pink scalds from various mishaps while straining pasta.
One woman had a nasty burn on her hand after her boyfriend's well-meaning attempt to serve a romantic meal saw an accidental mispouring of hot gravy.
Sadly, it didn't dampen their amour. I had front row seats in the adjoining cubicle as the couple decided to kiss and make up, separated from them by only a thin curtain. Voyeurism isn't all it is cracked up to be.
Mistaken identity
As students, my former flatmate and I felt sorry for the postman delivering all the Valentine's Day mail and decided to make him a card which we stuck to the front door. It was 3am and alcohol had been taken, but we were rather pleased with our handiwork.
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Some hours later we were woken by the thud of something dropping through the letterbox. It was a thank you note with two 10p Cadbury's Taz bars taped to it.
We gave ourselves a pat on the back for a job well done. Then the penny dropped. The postie thought the card had been drawn by two young children. Talk about crushed.
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