My Funny Valentine

There are worse ways to spend Valentine’s Day than waking up to lilies delivered by Alec, going out later that evening to meet Terry for dinner and cocktails on the NUSS terrace balcony, then being presented with even more lilies, going home to videoconference with Alec, and finally arranging my big combined lily bunch in a vase before going to sleep. There really are.

[In case it looks like I’m two-timing someone somewhere, rest assured that I’m not. I’m merely lucky enough to have a great guy friend in Terry who knows how to treat girls but doesn’t have any designs on me, a secure boyfriend in Alec who knows how much he is loved and therefore has no problems with my multitudes of close male friends, and the very pleasant coincidence between Alec and Terry of good taste in flowers.]

And that’s not all. Those of you who’ve been reading this site for a while may remember Bellagio, the inflatable, anatomically correct sheep Alec presented to me one night in Italy. When I had to leave for Singapore, we decided Bellagio would stay with Alec, since I didn’t think my mother would be particularly receptive to her charms, and she’d have lots of sheep friends in Ireland anyway. (There was, of course, the mild possibility that the other sheep could ostracize her due to her inflatable nature, but we hoped showing them her orifice would be proof enough of her essential sheepness.)

So as a charming epilogue to this tale of Valentine’s bliss, Alec, ever romantic, decided to show me just how much he appreciated the planter full of spring flowers I’d sent him. The best way of doing this, he thought, was by sending me a photo of Bellagio, posing shyly next to the planter, with a trowel in her fanny.

How To Pleasure Your Girlfriend With Sheep

I probably big-up Alec here a bit more than is healthy for his ego, but really, what kind of guy dresses a ghetto blaster up as a sheep, complete with cotton balls for fluff and black socks on toilet rolls for hooves, and carries it across London to give his girlfriend at Christmas?

Judging from the malevolent looks he was apparently getting from other guys in the tube, some might say a specially sad kind of guy, but let me redeem him from male condemnation here.

I’m rather fond of sheep. I think they’re cute (and for the record, I think most baby animals, some human babies, and fuzzy things in general are cute too, so sue me). For my past two birthdays, Russ gave me these adorable sheep, which I’m inordinately fond of.

Alec, being a cynical old git, is less than enamoured with their ickle fuzzy nature. Add to this the fact that Russ has a proud tradition of giving me kickass presents, and has also thrown down some cybergauntlets of his own, and you get my boyfriend’s decision to dress his gift to me up as a big motherfucker of a sheep, and make it trample the two ickle ones.

[I should clarify: no bad blood actually exists between them. They accept each other as important people to me, who they care about, but also legitimate sources of mutual shameless wisecracking. I love both of them dearly, and all three of the sheep. I love my ghetto blasta’ from Alec (it plays MP3 CDs!) and my Daydream Nation on vinyl (with poster and promo photo of the band, press release, and cover print!) from Russ. I am a veritable love-fest these days, which is a nice if embarrassingly soppy thing to be.]