I’m afraid I don’t have any sweet and sappy heart-shaped cookie cutter stories for you today. Nothing that involves red roses, hallmark cards, dark chocolates, romantic dinners, or making love by candlelight with Air Supply playing in the background. If you like, I can tell you about Pugsley’s anal sacs that are backed up again, this guy I want but can’t have because he keeps dicking around, a couple new wrinkles I found, or the enchanting evening I’m planning on having later with myself and a fresh set of double A’s.

I feel so discriminated against. Why isn't there a national holiday that celebrates being single and ones relationship to oneself? Isn't that just as important, if not more than having some lollipop couply thing that doesn't even exist crammed down my throat every year?

I'm not bitter, I'm honest. The reality is, I was trying to recall how long it’s been since I’ve had a sweetheart on Valentines Day but it’s been so long now that I can’t even remember the year. I do remember the last time I received flowers at work though, it was 1999. This year on Black Tuesday, I’m kind of numb to it all. I mean people lose limbs, arms, legs, and eyesight all the time. The point is they learn to adapt. Many times a guide dog is involved to help them navigate their way through life.

In a meeting today, I observed a newly engaged young woman extend her arm out, holding her hand far enough away from her body so she could size up her precious gemstone from different views, watching it sparkle and dance under the fluorescent light. She seemed entranced in another world of walking down aisles, dancing to Daddy's Little Girl, tossing her bouquet to an eager crowd of drunken women. There she sat, playing with it, twisting and turning it on her finger. Sometimes she would place her left hand on her chin, resting it there very deliberately with the ring facing outward in a contrived movement for all to behold. She was in her own little world, she was at peace.

Next to the bride-to-be sat a young woman all dressed in black. She had red cat scratches on her pale left hand that had no ring. She sat slumped down in her seat so her low rise trouser pants revealed a black sunburst tattoo on the backside of her outer left hip. Her short spiky hair was dyed jet black matched her onyx nail polish and eye make up. She yawned a lot but not because she's been staying up late at social gatherings. I’ve never seen her smile.

I know exactly the kind of ring I want someday. I don't want yellow gold or white gold. I want platinum. It should be at least 1.0 carat and I don't want round, pear, or marquee shaped. I want square -- Princess cut. Although emerald cut would be nice too. Bonus points if it comes in a little aqua blue colored box.

It makes me both inferior and superior that I am not betrothed with a sparkly bauble to prove it. On the one hand, it’s empowering to know that I am not controlled by some overwhelming and unnatural force that society defines as a woman’s worth. I am busy making my own shit happen. I can buy my own house and have my own child. I am responsible for my own orgasm...The princess cut would be nice but it's no longer a must have, it's moved way down on the list into the "nice to have someday" section. Like maybe after I’ve gone the adoption or sperm donor route on my own, and I’m 45.

But what's really scary is there is something inside of me that identifies with the thing of darkness, with the girl in black who never smiles and yawns all the time.

Engagement rings -- the crowning benchmark of love, commitment, and devotion. A one way ticket to babies, shared mortgage deeds and a lifetime of security. On paper at least. The women in relationships who don't have them but want them can turn into Gollum from Lord of the Rings if they aren't carfeful, a doomed tormented disfigured troll damned to a hellish existence fixated on the all consuming urge to get the Precious......at any cost.

Pugsley has this silky spot on the side of his face that I like to kiss, where his cheek mole with 2 black whiskers poking out resides. It smells strongly of Pug ear there. To me, there is no finer smell in the world than Pug ear. Except for maybe Pug feet or Pug belly. Someday I would like to bottle it up into a fragrance so when I need to be comforted I can have access to that smell. I think I'll call it Precious.