A man’s guide to Valentine’s Day

By Buz Schott

Here it comes again, guys, right after the Super Bowl. Men, Valentine’s Day is the Super Bowl to the ladies; second only to dragging some previously happy lout to the altar. So let me, with my 73 years of experience, pass on some valuable advice about her big day. Some of you are going to make some huge mistakes unless you heed my wisdom.

Flowers

First of all, don’t moan about being forced to buy overpriced flowers — just do it, cheapskate! Get a mushy card to go with them, and if your lady has an office job, absolutely have the flowers delivered there so that the other women there can tell her how lucky she is to have a clown like you. She will get to gloat and later you will get some leg.

Presents

1. If you buy her some lacy lingerie, unless she is a supermodel, for heaven’s sake do NOT buy some scanty, see-through outfit with a thong. You will both be glad, as some images are hard to remove from your memory.

2. Do not buy her a new crock pot or Suzanne Somers thigh-master. Save those for her birthday.

3. Don’t buy her any mechanical devices that require batteries. She probably has one or more of those as insurance against your fumbling.

Dining Out

1. Comb your hair!

2. Clean the empty beer cans out of your pickup.

3. In the restaurant, and I don’t mean Burger King, order a wine other than Boone’s Farm.

4. Flatter her, even if you don’t mean it. Remember, sincerity is the most important thing, and once you learn how to fake that, you’ve got it made.

5. This is her day so look intently into her eyes as if she were the only woman in the room, even if the waitress has a really outrageous butt.

6. In an Italian restaurant; avoid garlic and don’t show off by ordering Chicken Mussolini.

After Dinner/Wine

1. If you go back to your place, make sure that you have already harvested the mushrooms growing in your bathroom.

2. If watching television, don’t roll up a fatty and make sure that the DVD you rented is something weepy like “Sleepless in Seatlle” and not “The Dirty Dozen” or worse, “Romancing the Bone.”

3. In the bedroom, if you get that far, take off your socks.

4. In bed, absolutely do not fart and pull the covers over her head. You may think this is funny but I’m pretty sure she won’t.

The Day After

1. Bask in the glow of having done things right and enjoy the relief of knowing that now the pressure is off for another year. Finally, if you were so broke you had to steal the flowers you sent her from the nearest cemetery, don’t worry. Lots of other tightwads have done it.

2. If you did not take my sage advice, enjoy another date with Rosey.

A Final Cautionary Tale

I am going to tell you about an incident on Valentine’s Day, 1984. This is one I forgot to put in my unfinished autobiography. Come to think of it, all autobiographies are unfinished, aren’t they?

Come Valentine’s Day, 1984, I had been going out with an outrageously good-looking woman for about eight months, off and on. Her and I had been intimate, but more to the point, we had gone parachuting together twice and I decided to get her a funny Valentine’s present (roll of thunder, please). I bought her a pair of panties with hearts all over them and fastened a parachute rip-cord to the crotch – the joke here was that I could yank them off of her like opening a parachute.

She was all smiles and bubbly when I gave her the fancy-wrapped gift. HOWEVER, that was short-lived when she looked, in horror, at the contents. My present was about as well-received as a fart in a burka. Never give your lady a goofy Valentine’s present and you will be rewarded.

Buz Schott is a former Mammoth resident and brilliant painter whose prints can be found locally at The Looney Bean.