"Valentine's Day made me think of it..."

(above) a line by Hannibal Lector to Agent Starling...
"I can make you very happy on Valentine's Day..."

I was thinking about Raspail’s car and heads in jars when I was meandering Google today (wouldn’t THAT make a quaint love poem!)…I can smell the old oil, mouse droppings & dust emitting from that neglected mini-storage facility… and the mannequin with its fly open and a book of Valentines….Next Saturday I must work in the a.m., but that’s ok—I’ve never been one to get all fired up over flowers, candy, Valentine’s Day or my birthday—how ironic I was born on a day associated with a ‘saint’, as irreverent about religion as I am. On Wikipedia (hmmmf), one random story says “Saint Valentine upon rejection by his mistress was so heartbroken that he took a knife to his chest and sent her his still-beating heart as a token of his undying love… Hence heart-shaped cards are now sent as tribute for overwhelming passion and suffering…” Ha! How odd that John Q. is on TV at this very moment--a doctor has jabbed his finger into the open chest cavity of a young boy, poking his heart into action. ba-bump. ba-bump. Also strange this 'asian' antique postcard reiterates John Q., proclaiming ‘New Hearts for Old’ –one of the first examples that popped up when I was looking for some on Google. (Postcards, not hearts.) Ah, coincidences abound.

Never one that enjoys red roses (ick—I like pink varieties), I once received a huge bouquet of flowers with ferns & babies breath (from an awesome friend who was pretty much as relationship-wary as me). Soon, mysteriously, all that remained were lonely green stems as bare as the bones on a skeleton’s hand. I was left with mere sticks—my toddler had eaten every single delectable petal and I had to call the Poison Control hotline. Happy Birthday to me.I often receive combo Birthday/V-Day Victorian cards with cute little cherubs, cupids, large-eyed children, vintage floral, lace and beribboned designs and I think they’re all quite lovely… probably quite similar to Clarice’s find on the backseat of Benjamin's old Packard.

Again searching...how peculiar! Behold ‘Cupid the Cook’ Valentine: I find it extremely disturbing... reverberates with cannibalistic recipe terror much like this Silence of the Lambs youtube of the Man himself...

How would you like a nice warm heart with orange blossoms???
[or sauteed brains]

and now I give you your vivid portrait of sociopathic single-mindedness (with which copfriend will say...leave it to B to tie in holiday love & romance with brilliant serial killers):
I know if you click, you'll shudder!!!

Happy Valentine's Day.