I’ve been receiving a lot of Pre-Valentine’s Day requests from bloggers and trend-spotters who are pondering the best way to say ‘I love you’ on this, my holiest of holy days honoring the mysterious Saint Valentinus. I think about this holiday a lot, which is, of course, an occupational hazard. Who was St. Valentine, and how did he become synonymous with cheap chocolates and pajamagrams? (A dubious Wikipedia entry suggests that “the name Valentine comes from Rome and means smelly, loser, and weirdo.” My own personal, and thorough, I might add, baby-naming research seems to indicate that it actually means healthy, strong and worthy, but I digress. Ah, public forums.) The information available about his life is scant, but apparently, he was a Roman priest who was put to death for aiding Christian couples in marriage, which was illegal at the time. (Sound familiar, America?

Read the original here Valentine’s Day Gift Guide: Part I