The 4 Worst Ways You Could Possibly Spend Valentine's Day

Yes, the McDonald's in Southport, North Carolina, is holding its third annual Valentine's Day Candlelight Dinner, complete with table service and music specially selected by "Ron" (are we the only ones hoping this turns out to be the store manager coming out to your table, shirtless, while seductively playing a saxophone?). Your date will surely be too overcome by the atmosphere to notice that this is all happening within 10 feet of a huge plastic statue of a clown.

If you feel like a McDonald's date is for snooty pretentious types, you can always just head on over to Waffle House, where "devoted fans" can feast on their favorite Waffle House delicacy by candlelight and the sound of frying hash browns.

Yes, they're asking you to "apply" to be their spontaneous valentine. To qualify, you need to be a woman aged 19 to 24 who won't ask where the guys are from and "know who Zedd is" (we're assuming that's some kind of innuendo?).

Oh, and in true bro form, they repeatedly say they won't be like those shallow guys who expect you to eat a salad (they say they want a girl who enjoys "stuffing your face" and likes steak and beer), yet they do require a picture. Hey, they said they want a fun girl who eats tons of unhealthy stuff, not someone fat.

There, you and your lover can partake of a romantic tour of the old prison, where historians tell of inmates who were incarcerated due to love ("And when he found out the baby wasn't his, he stabbed her 175 times, severing the ..."). You will also enjoy light "hors d'oeuvres and desserts," and maybe when you get home you can role play cavity searches together.

We know what you're saying: "That sounds sexy as hell, but I don't live in Minnesota!" Don't worry -- you can do the same thing at the Detroit Zoo (they're serving booze at their shindig, and the chief life sciences officer warns that he gets "free and loose" with his animal sex lectures). Or maybe you'd prefer the same event in Calgary (their event is titled "Who's Your Daddy?"). Or Los Angeles, or Birmingham, or Albuquerque. This is a popular Valentine's Day pastime, is what we're saying.

Hey, if you're the fancy type and have the cash to travel, go to lovely Vienna and surprise your date with the Schoenbrunn Zoo's event, where you can hopefully see the ring-tailed lemur engage in its sensual mating routine ("The males rub their black and white tail with a strong smelling secretion from their scent glands and hold it under their opponent's nose. Who stinks the most is allowed to [mate] with the females"). Sign us up! After all, what the hell else is there to see in Vienna?

XJ would like to wish Happy Valentine's Day to his own valentine, Fenella. The third part of XJ's epic science-fiction novel is out now on Amazon. Poke him on Twitter and follow him on Facebook.

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