This Wednesday, February 13th, 2013 from 9pm until 12 (sometimes later) at Akbar, it’s CRAFTNIGHT!!!!
Project: 12th Annual Valentine CraftNight!!!
$2 Suggested Donation
$4 Cosmopolitan Drink Special – The Akbar Cosmopolitan: The Cosmo Larger Than Life
NEW FEBRUARY BADGE: While supplies last, limited edition “heart-on” pin!
I know you can’t wait for Valentine’s Day! I know you’ve got your day all planned, you’ve pressed your pink organza pants, the corsage is in the fridge, the mylar swooshy pompoms are waiting in their custom made yellow silk bag, yay, it’s going to be such finery! Oh, but if you’re one of those people who crinkles up their nose at this marvelous holiday and provides a litany of snarly comments, that’s the OTHER set of emotions that greets me every Valentines Day for the last 12 years of prepping for February 14th with Crafters.
Well, hopefully, if you show up, you’ll un-crinkle your schnoz because every crafter, in edition to the pin I’ve designed for this month gets a SPECIAL VALENTINE TREAT FROM YOUR CRAFT CAPTAIN!!! All you have to do is get a bag, write your name on it, put it in the “delivery area” and while you wait for Valentine surprises, make a few valentines for some of the other crafters’ bags sitting right next to yours!
Don’t get me wrong, I know why the sneering and jeering accompanies this heart-y holiday, here’s a list you may (or may not) appreciate.
PRESENTING: TRUE VALENTINE’S DAY MYTHS!
1.) Valentine’s Day is just a thinly veiled corporate scheme to cover up the three day festival Lupercalia which does not involve diamonds, dinner or giant cardboard heart-shaped boxes filled with cheap waxy chocolates.
2.) NOT celebrating Valentine’s Day only emphasizes Valentine’s Day MORE, which means that Valentine’s Day wins, because it only makes you look like a total ninny who is scared of doilies, the color pink, tiny babies with golden locks of hair and flappy wings, exciting exotic underwear, and dinner reservations.
3.) Valentine’s Day was invented by single people to make couples stress out and get in fights.
4.) The Valentine’s Day Mafia is a criminal syndicate that originated in the middle ages, and consists of a secret society of florists, greeting card companies, stuffed animal manufacturers, jewelers, chocolatiers and confectioners.
5.) Valentine’s Day was invented by your grandparents because you are a horrible grandchild, and your poor, sad, thankless relatives had to invent a holiday just to get your attention so that you’ll put a stamp on a pathetic little store-bought card and send it to them so that they’ll know you’re alive.
6.) Saying “I Love You” does not count on any day of the year unless it is on Valentine’s Day, and Valentine’s Day may not be celebrated by single people, parents, siblings, friends, acquaintances or just because. It is not a holiday celebrating love for everyone, it is only for two people that are currently in a traditional romantic relationship, and by romantic, I mean the public display of artificial, overly-contrived commercialized method of romance that our nation commands us to follow on February 14th.
7.) Hiking, parasailing, sunsets, roller coasters, roller skating, obscenely shaped marzipan, karaoke, picking a different day that works better for everyone, horseback riding, massage class, wine tasting, exchanging cookies, dressing up your junk like a lil’ circus animal, mix tapes, poems, sexy phone calls, or any other expression of love that is original and heartfelt or any other way of demonstrating what Valentine’s Day and Love means to you is not considered a REAL Observance of Valentine’s Day.
8.) Unless you are at least 20% miserable at some point in preparing/celebrating Valentine’s Day, you’re not doing a good enough job.
9.) Only women are miserable on Valentine’s Day, a man is supposed to leaf through SELF or Cosmo magazine and build up unrealistic expectations of emotional validation from the woman he loves who will hopefully use all her credit cards to send something to the man that is flashy and colorful so that the man can show off to co-workers and friends who will witness the act and catalogue it for future reference. LGBTQ couples either have to love or hate Valentine’s Day together at the same exact time. Single people have to wear unwashed sweatpants, eat an entire carton of ice cream, watch reruns on Hulu and cry or wail in 15-minute intervals. Married couples who have been together 10 years or over must forget Valentine’s Day exists or just acknowledge that they are dead inside and give each other a single dried rose. Kids can only give each other pre-made cards from the grocery store that come with stale Redhots. Freshly broken-up people must lay prone on the floor and moan, maybe roll around and accidentally inhale some dust and then roll over and sleep it off, after approximately 6 hours of this, a friend must take them to a bar, where all the freshly broken-up person’s drinks are free (including Shirley Temples).
10.) Okay yeah, you guessed it, this is all just a bunch of silly lies. But the way people do not like Valentine’s day has become just as predictable as the accepted cheezy corny commercial perception of Valentine’s Day! It’s totally hipster to hate on Valentine’s Day, did you know this?!? Don’t let ironic living spoil your FUN! Don’t live defensively! Be inventive and forward with your love! The scrutiny of others be damned! Eros is the ethos! It’s in all of us, for everyone, lovers, dreamers, dog washers, coffee stirrers, tire changers, nurf herders, etc. We don’t have a lot of time on this big blue marble! Being generous and kind to each other is reason enough to throw naval-gazing and hesitation out the window in order to please for the love o’ Mary just paste together something sweet for someone you think is cool! Myths 1-9 are TRAPS of the mind! Embrace #10!!! Get your butt in here, step up, conquer yourself and win! Be brave, get crazy and un-thinky and make a goddamn Valentine at CraftNight! And yes, Lupercalia Valentines are totally awesome, unless, of course, you’re giving up Lupercalia for Lent.
See you at the Love-tastic Valentine Shindig!
JP Craft Captain
www.crafthead.com
www.akbarsilverlake.com
