Off Message: Finally, a Valentine’s Day with a difference

Admit it – you feel a bit of relief at not having to remember to send flowers or traipse along to an overpriced restaurant with your other half next weekend

Valentine’s Day, which arrives next weekend, may well be the smuggest and worst of holidays, no matter where you sit on the relationship scale

I was in my first year of secondary school, sitting one day in French class as the teacher sketched out verb conjugations on the blackboard, when a knock at the door came. I was wanted in the principal’s office, a breezy second year student informed the teacher. Someone had attempted to send a Valentine’s card to me and it had been delivered not to my house, but the school. I was to go to the ...