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Feb. 16, 2023 - ParaNaughtica
01:12:10
Valentines Day Special

You ever wonder where we got these crazy ideas for Valentines Day? Who was Valentine, anyway? What happens when you get a bunch of men together in the Middle Ages? These are burning questions we set off to answer.... Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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I feel very strongly about bacon myself.
It said somewhere that bacon is actually, if you're vegan, bacon is the gateway.
Drug, if you will.
Oh, really?
To switch over.
Yeah, that's what they say.
That's how you go back.
Yeah, yeah.
Oh, okay.
I mean, I believe it.
I wouldn't think it would be like deli meat.
You know?
That would probably make you vegan for the rest of your life.
Absolutely. But Coop, did you know, speaking of bacon, did you know that bacon actually comes from the German root Bach, which refers to the back of a pig?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Bacon's been recorded in history as early as 1500 BC, actually.
Right, right.
The Chinese, actually, are said to be the first to cook it.
Yeah, yeah.
It's said that the average bacon eater eats about 18 pounds each year.
Oh, that's interesting.
Well, I got another one for you.
Did you know that there is a church of bacon?
In fact, I did.
Did you know that during World War II, bacon was used to make explosives for the war effort?
That's interesting.
Did know that, actually.
But did you know that the first food eaten on the moon included bacon?
Yes, actually.
I did know that.
But did you know that there are bacon condoms?
Well, I mean, everybody knows that, Coop.
They're covered with a special bacon water-based lube.
Duh. Thanks for telling me again, something that I've known my whole life.
Did you know that there is a Kevin Bacon statue actually made out of bacon?
Yeah, but it looks nothing like him.
And did you know that the saying, bring home the bacon, came from 12th century England when the church would give a flitch of bacon to any married man who had not argued with his wife for the entire year?
Yep, men who brought home the bacon were seen as good citizens.
You're baking me crazy.
That's a good one, man.
You know, speaking of good ones...
Do you know what the most successful pickup line is?
I'm crazy about you.
You're baking my heart milk.
No, that's incredibly stupid.
It's actually just, I've got bacon.
On a serious note, about half of all Canadians would choose bacon over sex.
Oh, well how about that?
Now, before we get started, I just wanted to give a couple shout-outs if that's alright.
It sounds to me like good old-fashioned entitlement, Coop.
I just want to give a shout-out to our self-proclaimed number one fan and scrapbooking expert, special fan indeed, a certain Mr. S. Benedactyl, as is his handle.
Oh, Mr. S. That could stand for literally anything.
And by the way, we have fans?
Well... He sent us an email, and unfortunately, he had to recently have his left gluteus maximus removed due to complications caused by engaging in the male form of kegels.
I'm unsure if this was under doctor's orders, or if...
Or if it was just leisurely pleasure that he kind of...
Yeah, it's hard to tell.
Yeah. I'm not too sure here as I'm reading his email, but it looks like he was trying to strengthen his pelvic floor muscles.
I'm not sure why.
That's really interesting.
I wonder what happened.
Like, how do you get complications, so to speak, from doing kegels?
That's just, I don't get it.
Well, it appears that as he was doing the kegels...
He says that the exercise was going well up until he was about 53 clenches in.
That's a lot of clenches, though.
I don't know much about kegels, but that just seems like too many clenches, if you ask me.
Yeah, I don't know.
But it says here that he was 53 clenches in, and as he was mid-clench, he felt this sort of snap or a pop or something weird, he says, in his left glute.
And at that point, he was unable to let the clench go.
He couldn't release the clench.
Oh my gosh, that is terrible.
Just release the clench already.
Yeah, it says here that his whole left leg sort of seized up in a clench mode, and it kept getting tighter, which made his lower leg raise up toward his ass as it got tighter and more painful.
So his heel was pressed onto as soon not to be their left buttock.
And he says that it stayed this way for at least 45 minutes before he finally decided to get medical help.
Did you say 45 minutes before he decided to seek medical attention for his perma-clenched leg slash buttock?
Yeah. Why would you do that?
Yeah, that's a great question, and maybe he can update us on that.
But he says that he could only hop on his right leg as he moved himself from his basement exercise room through a large common area currently under renovation, so there's all this shit laying around, and he had to navigate through all of that stuff and then go down a 15-foot hallway, then up 12 stairs,
turn 90 degrees to the right, and up 12 more.
My God.
Yes. What the?
From there, he then had to go through the kitchen area.
Down another small hallway and over to where he had left his cell phone on a table next to the front door, and he said that it was not easy work for a young man in his late 50s.
Apparently, it was also his birthday recently, so happy birthday.
From there, he dialed 911, and within another 45 minutes, he was finally rescued.
But they couldn't do anything for him and the ambulance on the way to the hospital, which was another half hour, he says.
Oh, man.
All these long waiting periods, man.
It's just like the stars were definitely aligned on this one.
Yeah, so the doctor went in to perform emergency surgery on his left butt cheek to relieve the tension.
But apparently the damage was done and there was nothing he could do.
And he had to remove the entire left gluteus maximus from our number one fan, our favorite, S-Benedactyl.
The S-Benedact.
That is rough.
Yikes. Yep, but he says that now, not all is lost.
It is easier to wipe.
So I guess I'm glad that it's easier for you to wipe S-Benedactyl.
But I am sorry for that loss of allegedly a choice cut of meat for practicing cannibals.
Yeah, damn.
That's so tragic.
We are very sorry to hear about that, S. Benedactyl.
Truly sorry.
But we hope that you can overcome that loss.
And man, sitting will never be the same.
So, happy to hear anyways that you're our number one fan.
That is truly fantastic.
So keep on listening.
And I'd like to give another shout-out to JP.
Thanks a lot for listening and enjoying the show, JP, and giving us some valuable feedback.
It's much appreciated.
Thank you so much.
Definitely, definitely thanks, JP.
You're a rock star.
I hope you have your full buttocks, sir.
On a serious note, as many already know, on February 6th, 2023, there was a 7.8 earthquake which shook Syria and Turkey.
Neighboring countries also felt the devastating quake, and it could even be felt as far away as Greece, Cyprus, Israel, Lebanon, and Palestine.
And about nine hours later, a 7.5 magnitude earthquake hit about 80 miles to the north, and the epicenter of the first quake was roughly 11 miles below the Earth's surface.
There were hundreds of aftershocks felt in the hours and days afterward.
But as of February 12th, that is today, Well,
which scientists say can cause serious damage.
With just 0.2 more at an even 8.0 on the fear-inducing Richter scale, it would have been classified by scientists as a great earthquake capable of destroying entire communities.
I think that's kind of silly.
They sort of differentiate that because clearly from this 7.8, from what I've been reading about this tragedy, entire communities have been wiped out.
I mean, am I wrong there?
The World Health Organization projected 20,000 deaths by the time that it's all been sorted out and cleaned up.
And a week later, already 34,000 have been attributed.
And I'm sure many more will be attributed to this as time goes on.
There's just no way to know right now.
I've read that a total of 23 million people are being affected currently.
And in terms of medical treatment, food, employment, and transportation, everything is very stretched thin.
They're just having a hard time getting access to those things.
And it's just all in all a very devastating situation.
I read something like over 12,000 buildings were totally destroyed.
And I mean, you can only imagine the thousands of others that are...
You know, slightly, quote-unquote, damaged.
But even if, you know, something's damaged just enough, its foundation is unsafe and there's no way you can, like, the building will remain habitable after that.
I mean, and who knows, like, with aftershocks and whatnot, you know, if the structures are just going to come down anyways.
So, unfortunately for so many people, it's just going to be a sad truth and it just came in the blink of an eye like that.
Nobody was expecting it.
There are also hundreds of thousands of people that have been left homeless in the wake of all of this.
And there's something like four and a half million people right now drawing on the resources of not just their home government, but governments all over the world, people trying to donate and share resources.
And the Red Cross is on the ground, of course, but it's going to take a global effort to get these communities back on their feet.
Yeah, it's a real mess over there right now.
And I know that there have been some engineers that were responsible for a lot of the buildings in that area that have been arrested, actually.
So that's interesting.
I'm not surprised by that, because you see and you look at a lot of these big buildings, and they just crumbled like it was nothing.
And from the images I was seeing, I was like, man, in America, there's so much code, and there's so much...
There are just so many rules and regulations.
I'm not saying that a 7.8 earthquake hitting is going to be fine, but I'm just saying our buildings don't have a tendency to just come toppling down unless they're old brick masonry.
And unless you live in Florida.
True. True.
But, you know, there's all sorts of political strife and insurgencies and civil wars happening over there right now, almost on a constant basis, over in Syria and whatnot.
And Syria is, like, right in the middle of a cholera outbreak on top of it all, too.
So that's extra horrible for them.
Yeah, it's freaking fantastic.
But, hey, man, this is crazy.
I want to bring this story up because it's really, it's heart-wrenching.
During that earthquake in the Syrian region, in the village of Khatma, to be exact.
There was a pregnant woman, a very, very pregnant woman, as in so very pregnant that she could expect to give birth at any moment.
Well, unfortunately, that moment came while the woman was trapped within the rubble of the five-story apartment building that she lived in with her husband and four children.
She was completely unable to escape.
The infant girl was found between her mother's legs, bruised and with some scratches, but otherwise okay, with the umbilical cord still attached.
The mother was dead.
So, the doctors estimated that the woman had given birth at least three hours prior to finding the baby girl, and it has not been determined if the mother was alive and went through labor while trapped in the rubble, or if she had died and then given birth.
They said that if one more hour had passed, that meant the baby would have perished as well.
Due to her temperature being 95 degrees when they found her.
But yeah, their entire family was found dead right there in one area, basically at the entrance of the building.
They almost got out.
When rescuers cleared the rubble away, they found a dead family with this living baby infant newborn between the mother's legs.
And she's expected to live and to make a full recovery.
She was seven pounds and apparently in good health.
Boy, that is a heavy story.
I mean, I know there's all this destruction, then you have this new life, and, you know, it's just going to be such a bizarre upbringing for this child who was found on this day and is already gaining notoriety because someday people are going to be just constantly like,
well, you know your circumstances, right?
Like, you were found, and, you know, it'll be tempting for people maybe to latch on, you know, to this creature, this baby as...
You know, a figure of hope that came out of, like a ray of light that came out of this dark time.
But that can be dangerous because, you know, this child doesn't know her family and doesn't know the circumstances that she can't, she's a baby, she won't remember.
And it's just going to be really bizarre.
Like, I can't imagine, you know, growing up to being an age where I start to remember things and someone tells me, yeah, you know, you were the only survivor in this.
Apartment building that collapsed and your whole family didn't make it and you were the only one.
Could you imagine growing up knowing that?
I would hate it, especially growing up.
Everyone's like, oh, you poor thing.
All the sorrow directed toward you because you survived this.
Your whole family's dead.
So you're basically this macabre celebrity your entire life and you're like, I don't want this.
Just leave me alone.
Yeah, exactly.
It's just like...
I don't know.
It's going to be bizarre, and it'll be interesting, but I am glad that the baby did survive because the last thing that they need over there is more people dying.
Kudos to the rescue workers who discovered the baby on time, and it's a very tragic circumstance, but at least she lived.
Yeah, my heart goes out to all the survivors and everyone who has lost their loved ones in this tragedy.
Well, Coop, I'm sure we'll be keeping an eye on that as it develops, if there are any more updates in the future.
But what do you say we turn the dial back to something a little more lighthearted?
Let's do it.
To the matter at hand, if you will.
Let's do it, man.
Let's go.
All right.
Well, on that note, it's time for three of three.
I have three updates for you guys.
I'm just going to kind of read them as headline style, and we're going to go into them a little bit.
The first one comes from Megan Quinn in an article written on February 4th, 2023.
A woman in Alabama says her group, a birthday party, was locked in a Japanese restaurant because a guest at her birthday did not want to pay their bill.
What do you think about that, Coop?
Pay your bill.
Simple as that.
Pay your bill.
Pay your bill.
You're not going to get locked into a building.
Yeah. There's some controversy sparked just because there's some saying that the people there weren't satisfied with the service and they weren't satisfied.
With their food, so they didn't want to pay.
And other people, you know what?
It's too bad you were there.
It's a hibachi restaurant, too.
So they had the performance while they're sitting there eating.
And then they just want to walk out.
And those are expensive meals, too.
Absolutely. And they just want to head out.
And the management said, no way, Jose, and locked him in there.
I just think, pay your bill.
You know, you go into a restaurant with the expectation to eat a meal.
You order a meal, and I feel right then and there, you have signed a contract that the thing you ordered, you will pay for.
I agree.
Goods for services.
I mean, that's like what our country is based on, man.
Now, unless there's a band-aid in the food or tip of a finger or something in it, some hazard, obviously, you know, there are circumstances where it's like, I'm not paying for this.
And it will be reasonable.
Yeah. So I don't know what was happening here, why these people felt like they don't need to pay for the food they ordered.
It sounds to me like good old-fashioned entitlement, Coop.
Now, locking them in a building I don't think is going to solve anything.
You're not going to get your money that way.
No. Yeah, it's not like you're going to be able to keep them long enough so where they beg you to let them go and they pay you the money without incurring some kind of crime, some kind of charge against you
for wrongful imprisonment.
Right. Yeah, does that become – Wrongful detainment.
Yeah, does that become like kidnapping, wrongful detainment, some sort of shit.
It's got to be illegal.
Yeah, totally.
I mean, it's just not allowed.
I mean, the best thing you can do is just try to find the information of these tenants or these people who...
Left without paying and, you know, file the appropriate legal paperwork.
That's going to be your best route.
Well, yeah.
Pay your bill.
Yeah, well, speaking of entitlement and goods for services, if you will, this article, update number two, comes to us from John Wright, apparently, Coop, a popular real estate influencer, Daniela Rendon,
31. Yep.
Yep. Yep.
Owned a small business, this real estate person, and she collected the bailout money, if you will, for businesses to protect them that the government was giving out during COVID times.
And she turned around and used that money on herself and not to enhance her business.
Selfish. Of course, posted it all over Instagram.
Of course.
As a good human of this day and age does.
And they started taking a closer look at her.
And now she's being charged with fraud.
Good. Send her away.
Throw away the key.
I agree, man.
It's just she sent fake data to banks in New Jersey and Idaho and $381,000 in loans was dispersed directly into her corporate bank account, sir.
That is dangerous.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, she definitely did some illegal activity there.
I think she needs the book thrown at her on this one.
I agree.
Unfortunately, she's an attractive woman.
I feel that the courts will probably give leniency on her because she's beautiful.
Well, we'll see about that.
I mean, among other things, she rented a luxury apartment in Biscayne Bay.
She paid for some cosmetic dermatology procedures.
She repaired her designer shoes and other offenses that she used this money for.
And to date, she's been charged with seven counts of wire fraud.
Two counts of money laundering and one count of aggravated identity theft.
Apparently she faces up to 20 years in prison if she's convicted.
And the prosecutor argued that she was a flight risk, likely to escape to her native Colombia.
So a judge set her bond at $150,000.
Yeah, alright.
I'd say keep your eyes close on her.
Do not let her go.
Throw the book at her and let's move on.
Yeah, people need to just, you can't do that.
Everybody wants to get caught up, swept away in this TikTok hype.
Not to throw TikTok under the bus, but just social media in general.
Look at my life.
Look at how well my business is doing.
I'm making it.
A lot of it's fraudulent.
Just look at the Chrisleys.
They just went down for fraud.
Something similar.
Real estate moguls taking some money out here, paying it over here, but taking out more money here, switching up who's taking it out to make it look more favorable to the banks to procure these loans.
Now they're sitting in prison, dog.
You can't do that.
What you just explained is how the U.S. government works.
They can get away with it.
But you and I will go directly to jail for doing exactly what the government does.
That is a cynical view, but it is 100% correct, my friend.
That is how...
Hey, man.
I'm sorry for telling the truth, but that's what we do here.
Never apologize for telling the truth.
All right.
I'm sorry for being sorry.
My last update comes to you from Deanne Durbin in an article written on February 9, 2023.
Chick-fil-A...
It's testing its first plant-based sandwich.
Now I hear these plant-based meats are kind of expensive.
That is true, and that's I think partially because of the A, they're not grabbing up as much market share as traditional meated products, and B, the processes that it takes to...
Make said meatless items is a little bit more involved than just hacking it off an animal and throwing it in a fucking cardboard box as you drive past a window.
Yeah, right.
How do you feel about it?
I'm not a vegan.
I'm not a vegetarian.
I am an herbivore.
I've had plant-based meats.
Not a big fan.
I like authentic meat.
Some of them, yeah.
I mean, I do too.
Some of it's alright.
You know, I've had the occasional bean burger just to try it out.
You know, you're not feeling a greasy, heavy burger.
But yeah, apparently the Atlanta-based chain said Thursday that it's testing its first plant-based entree, a breaded cauliflower sandwich, at restaurants in Denver, Charleston, South Carolina, and Greensboro.
And that test begins February 13th, so tomorrow.
Oh, wow.
A culinary team from Chick-fil-A said they spent four years developing the sandwich.
Time well spent?
Yep. Customers said they wanted to add more vegetables, and they obliged.
So it'll be interesting to see how that works out.
It's probably going to bomb.
Yeah, I'm interested in seeing that.
I think it'll have like a...
A nice spike at first.
You know, people will be interested in it and we'll eat it for a while and people will be like, this isn't quite as good as I thought it would be.
I'm going to go back to the bacon.
Yeah, I'm going to go back to bacon.
It always goes back to bacon, Coop.
Just cross back over.
Well, last week we said we'd do something special for the day that we humans have dedicated to the name of love because there is nothing more special than the act of showing love to one another, no matter if it's a man and woman, woman and woman.
Man and man.
Woman and woman and man.
Man and man and man and woman.
Or woman and woman and woman and man and man.
Or any which way your preferences may be.
Yeah. Amen.
Love is love in the eyes of the Lord.
Scott, I managed to mimic the hand movements of the gateskeeper in the clandestine game of patty cake, which coincidentally happened to be the secret password.
And from there, I scoured the dark cobweb recesses of forgotten storage rooms and latrines beneath what I was told was the Vatican.
Was it the Vatican?
What was it?
I don't know, honestly.
I have no idea.
Well, what did you see?
It was too dark.
I couldn't see anything.
You didn't, like, think to have a lamp or anything?
I had nothing but fear and an overwhelming feeling that I had to poop.
Ah, as one does.
You know, before I began researching for today's episode, I didn't know where Valentine's Day, as we know it, came from.
You know, like how old is Valentine's Day?
That was one of my questions.
And to who do we give our many blessings to have such a day dedicated to consumer – sorry, to love –
Sure, right.
Well, I have no answer to either of those highly critical questions.
They are certainly questions that need to be asked, though.
And I'd like those answers.
As well.
And I would like to give those answers to you, Scott.
So let's talk about the beginnings of what we know of today as the Feast of St. Valentine or St. Valentine's Day or just Valentine's Day.
Well, that sounded sad.
Ah, yes.
Valentine's Day.
Single people despise it.
Couples get horny over it.
Do you think that...
Do Kleenex and lotion sales go up on Valentine's Day?
Good question, Scott.
Let's ask the listeners.
If any of our listeners work in the sales department, do Kleenex and lotion sales go up on Valentine's Day?
Email us at paranautica at gmail.com and let us know.
Let us know.
These are the burning questions.
It's a day that most of us have been taught during our childhoods to give to our crush or the person we like a special handmade lovey-dovey card and some cheap chocolate or those nasty little chalk candies.
And over time, depending on who your crush or your partner is, the gift-giving becomes a very carefully planned action because no man wants to give his partner the wrong gift.
This can equal a very quick ending to what he had hoped would otherwise have been a wonderful evening ending with sex.
And it's said that men generally spend far more on gifts than their partner.
On dining, a night out, and gifts and whatnot.
Apparently on average, men spend around $340 on their loved one, while women spend an astonishing $64.
I am shocked that it's $64 and not less, to be honest, in my experience.
Things of monetary value, diamonds, jewelry, cars, houses, flowers, inanimate objects, have replaced the true representation of love.
Hallmark and any number of jewelry stores have banked on this throughout the years, as we know, and Valentine's Day has become a multi-billion dollar industry, as have all major holidays.
The world-renowned card maker has a card for any occasion.
You can get a card to celebrate National Boss Day on October 16th, Clergy Appreciation Day on October 9th, Tax Day on April 15th, Ferris Wheel Day on April 14th, and many others,
of course.
A holiday on a holiday.
Mr. Joyce Clyde Hall is the man who started it all in 1910 when he got off of a train in Kansas City, Missouri, with two shoeboxes full of picture postcards, and he needed to do something with them.
So he began selling them, and it was a slow process.
But soon, he entered into a postcard business with his broha, Raleigh Harpies.
Raleigh? Really?
Yeah. Well, I do now.
I wish I didn't know.
In fact, mine is much more common than yours is.
Oh, interesting.
Okay. Well, I've looked up the meaning of my name, and it just means of Scotland or Scottish descent, so it's not particularly interesting.
It's not.
As far as names go.
Yeah, you hit a little bit of a dead end there.
Mine is a barrel maker.
Oh, that's really cool.
It'll be for wine.
Of course.
Yeah. I'm not a big fan of wine.
Never have been.
Come 1913, Joyce began offering official Valentine's Day cards and by 1916, it became an industry all its own.
On average, around 145 million Hallmark cards are bought and sold every year.
This year, 2023, it is expected that people will spend around $26 billion on Valentine's Day, which is an increase of about $2 billion from last year.
And a curious little fact here, Scott.
Two billion dollars is a lot of money, right?
That is a shitload of money.
How many billionaires are there in the world?
I would guess...
Honestly, if I was just going to guess, I wouldn't say...
I don't have a number in mind, but I just don't think it would be very many, honestly.
Well, it's so that there are 3,311 billionaires in the world.
Whoa, man.
Now, these people have accumulated billions of dollars in wealth in a matter of years, right?
Now, let's take you and I, for example.
If you could save $100,000 every year, it would take you 20,000 years to save $2 billion.
Wow, that's bleak.
And if I could save $10,000 every day, then it would take me 548 years to save $2 billion.
Isn't that fucked up?
Man, that's intense.
$10,000 a day would take 548 years to save $2 billion.
To save $2 billion.
Yeah, and these people are just billionaires already in their 40s and 30s.
Kylie Jenner was the world's youngest billionaire.
By the time she was 21 or 22 or something like that, she already was net worth the billion dollars.
I was like, what does she need a billion dollars for, man?
Now, what about suicide?
Yeah, what about it?
Well, it's commonly believed that suicide rates typically rise during Valentine's Day, as well as the other holidays where family and togetherness are the underlying basis for the holiday itself, such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, Mother's and Father's Days, and even birthdays.
But I have read a lot of conflicting articles about the actual rate of suicides on V-Day, and there appears to be a myth that suicides rise dramatically on V-Day, which has been pushed by the media for many decades.
And so, a legitimate study was conducted to find out the truth once and for all.
The Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania conducted this study and published it in 2022.
Basically, suicides actually decrease before, at, and after Christmastime.
And if you look at a chart developed...
After a decades-long study on suicide rates on holidays provided by the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.
Oh yeah, they told us how fun radiation is last week.
They did?
Well, if you look at their chart, which you can find online, you'll see that the suicide rates are lowest around December and January.
And as the year goes on, the rates increase incrementally each month.
And then they begin to wane again towards the end of the year.
It seems that July, August, and September generally have the highest rates.
But this study was designed to debunk the exact myth which gets pushed through the mainstream media.
That's what the media does.
They incite fear, hatred, and divisiveness amongst the people.
They spread lies and propaganda.
Fake news!
Fake news!
And I think we all know this, but men are three to four times more likely than women to kill themselves.
And as of 2022, men hold a slight advantage in world population over women, coming in at 50.3%.
But don't go to Qatar if you're looking for a wife, because for every 100 females, there are 266 males.
That's the highest ratio in the world.
And as a man...
Your best chance to find love, statistically speaking, would be in Hong Kong, where 54.21% of the population is female as of 2021.
But enough of all that claptrap.
Let's get into the interesting history of the mystery of Valentine's Day.
Finally! My god, man!
Yes, my master.
I think we are all familiar with the fact that Valentine's Day was named after a Catholic saint, right?
I do now.
I wish I didn't know.
But it is speculated that it wasn't necessarily named after just one saint.
There are some discrepancies, but it appears that the Catholic Church recognizes three saints, all named either Valentinus or Valentine.
And all three were murdered and became martyrs at a later date, as is how martyrdom works.
It's alleged that there are as many as twelve other Valentines within the Catholic records that are on the list, and the most recent Valentine that was canonized was St. Valentine Barrio Ochoa.
He had traveled to Vietnam from the Philippines, where he was sent from Spain by the Dominican Order.
And while in Vietnam, he was betrayed by an apostate and was beheaded alongside St. Jerome Hermosia and Blessed Peter Amato back in 1858.
So, it is said that in the 3rd century, the Roman Emperor Claudius II, also known as Marcus Aurelius, needed men to join his army, but as much needed men were being taken by all the horny women and being married off.
Leaving his roll call sheet quite short.
So what did he do?
He put a decree banning all marriages.
This way, all the single men would be his for the taking.
But strangely, Marcus Aurelius' sexual preferences were deemed a bit odd for the times.
You see, he only liked women, not men.
Which wasn't the norm.
It is well known that the Romans regularly partook in homosexuality.
For them...
Their manliness wasn't threatened if they took on the role of giver rather than receiver.
Something that I've known my whole life.
Sheesh. Marcus Aurelius must have been severely bullied for his odd behavior.
That would not fly these days.
Luckily, he was the emperor.
Although marriages were outright banned, there was one outlaw clergy member who defied the ungodly orders of a mere mortal man.
Valentine was his name, and he felt that the Emperor had no right to ban marriages, as that was God's work.
So he carried on marrying couples in secret for some time until he was finally discovered.
The Emperor sentenced him to death, and he was soon beheaded publicly, as was the standard procedure.
Can you imagine if we still put on public executions?
Bro, I can guarantee you that if public executions were a pay-per-view thing, it would blow UFC out of the water.
Easily. I mean, honestly, one of the last...
I feel like I read somewhere, and I should fact-check this, and people can fact-check me, but I feel like Oregon had one of the last public executions, and I don't think it was all that long ago, honestly.
Really? Yeah, the last public execution wasn't all that long ago.
That's pretty interesting.
But others say that it was Saint Valentine of Turney, a bishop of the same time period, and he too was beheaded.
Still, others say that one of these saints also helped Christians escape Roman prisons, but he too was found out and killed.
Others say that one of these saints was put into a prison cell and kept there for quite some time, and while housed there to await his execution, the jailer's daughter would often spend time with him, and they would talk about all the daily gossip.
It is said that he fell in love with her and wrote her a love letter, a poem, and signed it from your Valentine.
Whichever story may be the most accurate or most plausible, We know that the day we have assigned to love was named after a Catholic saint from the 3rd century AD.
At least, that is what is agreed upon.
That is it for today's episode.
We hope we have you back next week, and until then...
No! So now we have an idea of why it was named.
And it's definitely an interesting part, but it isn't the most interesting part.
The most interesting part...
It comes from much further back in the past than the 3rd century AD, and it is the strange practices that surround this celebration which planted the seed that blossomed into what we know today as Valentine's Day.
How we celebrate now, compared to how they did back then, is, you could say, laughable.
Sure, yeah.
I'm sure they weren't folding a piece of paper in half and drawing a stupid heart on the inside with some ridiculous four-word declaration, like...
Will you be mine or I really like you on the front?
I'm sure they weren't timidly handing you a box of aforementioned chalk candy, which I actually liked chalk candy, which is an interesting fact about me, to someone that they had a crush on, you know?
Nah, they weren't bashfully talking about their favorite foods and avoiding eye contact at all costs.
No. At least not the Romans in the 6th century BC.
If not earlier than that.
But that is the earliest known date that the celebration of Lupercalia was celebrated distinctly in Rome from February 13th to the 15th.
Now, there are people who say that the Greeks started it with a different name prior to the 6th century BC, the name being Lycaea, which was celebrated distinctly in Greece.
There's also some speculation that human sacrifice was observed during those early celebrations, but nothing concrete has been verified.
Alright, so this might seem out of place at first, but it is actually going to make sense.
And there isn't much about the Greek connection, so it's easier to just put it here.
So it seems fair to credit the ancient Greek for their rituals, mythology, legends, and folklore throughout the ages, as bits and pieces have been kept in many of today's traditions.
In Arcadia, Greece, on the mountainous peninsula of Peloponnese, there was a festival called Lakaia, which happened on Mount Lakaion, or Wolf Mountain.
in honor of the Greek god of fertility, which gave protection over the shepherds and their flocks.
The god's name was Pan.
Thank you.
Scott, you remember Pan's Labyrinth, right?
The 2006 Spanish-Mexican film was filled with imagery from the mythos of Greco-Roman mythos of Pan and Echo.
Echo, of course, being a nymph that would bang Zeus until his wife Hera caught him and ordered that the nymph could only speak the last words spoken to her.
Yeah, I remember Pan's Labyrinth.
I actually thought it was really well done, just on a personal note.
It was very fantastical, and I thought it was pretty cool myself.
Yeah, I liked it a lot.
So Lycaion was a purification festival that would drive away evil spirits and would improve the upcoming year's crops.
So, you look at the Roman adoptions.
They named their festival Lupercalia, clearly after the Roman god Lupercus, which was the protector of animals and the fertility in sheep.
They also associated their festival with wolves, like the Greek.
The Romans also associated the beginning of their festival with Evander.
Evander? You mean, like, the real deal?
The undisputed cruiserweight champion had his ear eaten off by Tyson in round three?
You remember that, right?
The way he kind of, like, licked at it at first, like...
Yeah. And then he sort of like kissed it, and I swear you could see him saying something like, Oh, look at you there, all nestled up on that big old head, looking delicious, fatty gristle on a ribeye.
Come here, let daddy bring you home.
No, not the self-described late bloomer Evander Holyfield, dammit.
Ah, well, gosh darn it.
Evander of Arcadia, the legendary Greek hero.
Of course, that Evander.
He decided to leave Palantium in Arcadia and move to greener pastures, to Italy, where he founded his own town named Palantion.
It was here that he introduced everything Greek to the Romans.
This would include their festivities.
But instead of the Greek Pan to worship, Evander changed it over to the Roman Faunus, the god of the forests, the fields, and fertility.
Palantion is also right where the Romans would celebrate their first Lupercalia, over on Palantine Hill.
Okay, sweet.
So, what exactly is Lupercalia?
Lupercalia was a yearly festival that took place at the Lupercal Cave in Palatine Hill, beginning on February 13th and lasted until the 15th.
February was also a sacred month for the Romans, and they would celebrate Juno Februata, the goddess of febris, or fever of love, women, and marriage.
Also, for the ancient Romans, March was the beginning of a new year, and February was a time to bring in with the new and outstanding,
The Lubricol Cave is the cave where tradition holds that Romulus and Remus were suckled by the she-wolf, or a lupa.
Romulus and Remus were brothers who, when they became adults, wanted to build a city but couldn't agree upon a spot of which to build.
So Romulus did what a Romulus would do, and he killed Remus and became the sole founder of what would become Rome.
Dracalia would begin with special priests called the Luperci, or the brothers of the wolf, dressed in only goat skins, who would sacrifice dogs and goats on an altar.
And if you recall, dogs and goats are symbolic to fertility in ancient Rome.
After the sacrifice, two priests would walk up to the altar and the lead priest, the one who cut the animals'throats with the
They would then take a piece of wool that had been soaked in goat's milk and would wipe away the blood, and as they would do so...
would laugh out loud.
Then what followed was called the Feast of the Lupercal.
This was a massive feast of sacrificed animals, which would officially start the Lupercalia festival.
There would be much wine imbibed and people were encouraged to be naked, especially the women, who would
Yeah, go figure.
As the people ate, the priest did something different.
They would be off cutting strips of hide from the animals'carcasses.
These strips were called februa, or means of purification.
They would then take their strips of hide, and with many of the younger men, would run around Palatine Hill in a counterclockwise direction and down through the town, naked or in loin.
Things would change over time.
Parts would be taken out, parts would be replaced, parts would be added over hundreds of years.
But Plutarch gave us a description of Lupercalia during his time, which was around 45 to 120 AD. Here's a recording of it now.
Many of the noble youths and of the magistrates run up and down through the city naked for sport and laughter, striking those they meet with shaggy thongs.
And many women of rank also purposely get in their way, and like children at school, present their hands to be struck, believing that the pregnant will thus be helped in delivery, and the baron to pregnancy.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, don't ask where we got that recording.
It's highly secret.
Highly classified.
We could tell you, but then we'd have to slap you with a strip of rawhide.
And you might like that, so we can't do that.
And you might like that.
You might become pregnant.
The LaPerche priests, and some say many men joined in on this, would run through the streets following the route Romulus and Ramos took.
After defeating Amulius in battle, slapping women with the fresh strips of animal hide.
The women were all for it, though, and as Putark describes, would purposely get close to the men with the hide strips so that they could be whipped and therefore given luck in conceiving a child, and even more luck with living through childbirth.
Then, on the 14th, young unmarried women in the form of teenage girls would put their name on a piece of paper and put that paper into a container.
Some accounts say it was an urn.
Which would make sense if he considered out with the old and in with the new, or out with death comes life.
Then the young unmarried men, one by one, would pull a piece of paper from the urn.
He would then be paired up with the girl whose name he chose, and the two would be vivaciously sexual for the rest of the year, all in the name of fertility.
And back then, March was the beginning of a new year, so they'd have like a couple weeks.
And that would be the festival.
I couldn't find anything on the winding down of Lupercalia on the last day, the 15th, but I'm sure it's much like the winding down of any festival.
Sure. You know, there's a general burned out feeling, but people are still going hard on the drink.
Yeah. I'm sure inhibitions were at an all-time high for most on that last day.
Yeah, I wonder with such an extreme, like it seems so extreme for us now, you know, like people running around slapping each other with rawhide, drinking a whole bunch, but I mean, not really though.
You know, if you look at Burning Man or Electric Daisy Carnival, I mean, they might not be strips of rawhide, but there's still, like, weird shit going on.
A lot of weird shit.
Yeah, I'm sure there was a big kind of universal come down, and I'm sure that getting back into the economical flow of things was probably really difficult.
Colt, you know, lots of smeared face paint and that look of heartache and abandonment and bloodshot eyes, the scent of sorrow, walking
the gait of a forlorn person struggling with the meaning of life, you know, that they've questioned over the past couple of days.
Oh, yeah.
Stumbling around, dragging feet, dressed in misplaced scarves and bandanas tied around
the wrists and upper arms you know you got the i have horace tattoos oversized sunglasses barefoot of course oh yeah yeah chokers tie-dyed fingernails homemade necklaces made out of rocks and wire and you know those uh popular whitewash cut off
shorts with the purposeful rips oh yeah yeah
We got various, you know, shoddy braid work clearly done in the dark.
Oh, yes, sir.
A modern-day Coachella.
Everyone partook in the festivities.
In 44 BC, Caesar asked Mark Antony to whip his wife, Calpurnia, to help her conceive a child.
I'm not sure if that worked.
And historically, when Mark Antony was offering Julius Caesar a crown to proclaim him king, and Caesar repeatedly refused the offering, Well, this happened during Lupercalia, and historians say it was all, in fact, an act for the people.
So anyway, these festivities would go on with the usual fun up until 494 AD, when, oh, I've got a stick up my ass and I demand absolute power and control, Pope Galatius decided that the fun could not go on, that the party must stop,
The clothes need to be put back on, the sexuality needs to be extinguished, and the most orthodox of Catholicism must be adhered to and stringently followed, so help me God.
More like the ass he is, Galatius.
You know what I mean?
Yeah, I got that.
You know what I mean?
guy told the emperor of Rome that he, Pope Galatius Almighty, was far superior and far more important to humankind than any emperor could ever dream of being.
Now, he didn't say it quite like that.
But he did tell them that there are two powers that rule over people, and that he, the Pope, was more important because he still needed to take into account the matters of the king upon the king's death, or some shit like that.
And this became the model for each successive pope to follow.
And he was elected on March 1st, 492.
So he had been elected on the day that the Lupercalia blind date couples could split if they didn't like the matchup they were in.
Glacius went on a campaign of letter-writing to various senators and people of Sway.
He wrote a letter called Du Sunt, which he wrote to Anastasius on the subject.
This had a huge political impact, and in turn the festival of Lupercalia was extremely watered down.
It didn't end, though, but it became a boring shell of what it once had been.
He renamed Juno Febriata to the Feast of the Purification of the Virgin Mary.
Oh yeah, much easier.
Rolls off the tongue naturally.
And today, it is known as Canlimus, or Canlimus, or however you pronounce that.
The Presentation of the Lord in a much longer title, The Purification of the Blessed Virgin and the Feast of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple.
Oh, Jesus.
You said it, man.
Nobody fucks with the Jesus.
You see, Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire in 325 AD, and the church leaders wanted to get rid of all the pagan festivals, and Lupercalia was obviously very high on their list to do.
But the citizens were totally against it.
They loved the festival, and why wouldn't you?
Are you crazy?
What are you doing?
What the hell are you doing?
So when Glassius came into power, he tried hard to get rid of Lupercalia.
But knew that he couldn't rid of it completely.
The next best thing that he could do was change its name and try to change how the festival was celebrated.
It's said that he implemented St. Valentine into the celebrations and tamed it all down with a Christian vibe.
But it is also suspected that he did not implement St. Valentine and that St. Valentine was added into the mix much later.
Other Christian changes that he implemented, both girls and boys would write the names of saints on pieces of paper, and they would put those into the urn, and then they would draw them.
Fantastic. Great.
The people found this to be quite boring.
Yeah. There is no longer a sex lottery.
Ugh. No nudity.
Boring. And some accounts say that this is when the men began to write romantic letters to the women that they wanted, and would sign the letters...
With St. Valentine's name.
And this is how the celebration would continue well up into the Middle Ages.
But the celebration didn't end for everyone everywhere.
The festival would continue to go on well into the 10th century, it is said.
But the original pagan aspects, such as nakedness, sex, drunkenness, and etc., were whittled away and replaced with more Christian ideals, such as wearing too much clothing, being too sober, and no sex until marriage.
Oh, wow.
Way to clean up society.
Good job.
You know, it's really interesting because the Christians had adopted some pagan aspects into their own religion, like a lot of the important things that you hear about.
Yeah, some of those most basic things taught in Christianity were literally derived from ancient paganism.
An example is the idea that everyone was immortal.
They had an immortal soul.
Now this came from ancient Egypt and Babylon.
Yeah, didn't the Egyptians come up with the idea that our souls go to a place such as heaven or an afterlife?
I'm not sure they called it heaven, but they had a place synonymous with it.
But their story was that the god Osiris was killed by his brother, Set, and chopped into many pieces, and each piece was spread around Egypt.
It is said that his soul went to a place that we could think of as Christian heaven.
And then Osiris'wife, Isis, found all the pieces, except for his penis, oddly enough, which is important, probably the most important.
So she fashioned an artificial phallus, if you will.
And then she said some magical words, did some stuff, and she breathed life.
And that was the first time, as far as historians know, that the idea of a resurrection was created.
In fact, many ancient mystery religions had these ideas as their central teachings far before Christianity became an outlier.
And Babylonian mythology says that Ishtar had a son named Tamurts, and he would die each year and be reborn again in the spring.
And the ancient symbol for Tammuz was a T, like the letter T. And that's interesting, because the ancient pagan religions were using this symbol as a cross forever.
But the Bible has no record of the shape of the famous quote-unquote crucifix that we know today as being what Jesus was crucified on.
In fact, the Romans would often just use an upright pole to crucify people on.
And there's a lot of artistic imagery throughout those times that depict that.
The point being that the cross just wasn't quite symbolic yet.
And the symbol that early Christians were using before they started using the crucifix was actually the fish.
Ah, the fish.
What a fish!
What a fish!
So yeah, it's said that the cross wasn't used as a religious symbol by the Christians until after Constantine and his army were about to enter into battle against the rival Roman emperor, Maxentius.
And while at the famous Milvian Bridge, Constantine saw the vision of what came to be known as the Milvian Cross.
There must be war!
God wins it!
And this cross would later be put on his army's shields and all of his stuff.
And that was the moment that he converted to Christianity, and in fact, the first Roman emperor to do so.
Not, uh, just to be clear.
I just want to clear this up for the historical record and accuracy and all that.
You're not talking about Keanu Reeves, Constantine, right?
I just want to make sure that everybody knows.
We're not talking about the movie Constantine starring Keanu Reeves.
Oh, man.
I'm sorry.
I'm just not following you at all then.
Well, did you know that the concepts of a Christmas tree with ornaments and Santa, that came from Pagan Ideas?
And the same goes for Easter, where the ancients would celebrate the spring festival of the goddess of light in spring, Oster, and like the ornaments of a Christmas tree, Easter eggs were also a pagan idea.
And it's said that in Mithraism and pre-Zoroastrianism, which were Persian and Iranian religions respectively, as well as various other religions in the Mediterranean and in Egypt, They all had a Jesus-like figure who was synonymous with the Son of God and a mediator between the heavenly gods and earthly man.
And it should be stated that most, if not all, of these ancient religions were polytheistic.
That is, they worshipped more than one god.
And in fact, monotheism and Christianity would simply be adopted from the Hebrew scriptures.
But check this out and tell me what you think.
Timothy Frecke, who has an honors degree in philosophy and the author of over 20 books on world spirituality, and Peter Gandy, who has a master's in classical civilization and is an internationally respected authority on the ancient pagan mysteries and early Christianity,
These two guys wrote a book called The Jesus Mysteries.
It's a great read, but they have gathered enormous information on the ancient religions and have found numerous parallels between Christianity and paganism, namely, a god-man.
Part God, part man.
Now, the God-man, Osiris Dionysus, this being Osiris in Egypt and Dionysus in Greece, well, he, they were the son of God who was born to a human virgin on December 25th in a cave or type of animal shed.
In the company of three shepherds, he becomes a prophet and helps his followers to rid of their old selves, to die and be born again through the ritual of what we know as a baptism.
The God-man works miracles, too, and even turns water into wine and can raise the dead.
He regularly rides a donkey and the townspeople honor him by waving palm leaves.
He has a tight group of homies to whom he offers the chance of redemption.
The God-man would die at Easter, but would resurrect on the third day after his death, in which he ascends to heaven.
This resurrection was then celebrated by ritually eating bread and drinking wine, which are symbolic of the God-man's flesh and blood.
Who does that sound like?
Well, that's pretty incredible.
So, let's hop onto our Caspians, or whichever primitive horse you want, and let's trot on back to the Middle Ages.
Well, that's no ordinary rabbit!
That's the most foul, cruel, and bad-tempered rodent you ever set eyes on!
At this point, Lupercalia is so watered down, so whitewashed, that it didn't resemble the celebration that it once had, and it is surmised that it no longer existed at all.
If Lupercalia didn't exist anymore, how could drunk, horny men and lustful women, surrounded by nothing but filth, pestilence, hunger, and sorrow, show their affection to one another?
I don't know.
But, it's interesting to note, women appeared to be more interested in sex and love during the 8th century and onward, especially when compared with today.
Oh, really?
Yeah, that's what they say.
I mean, I believe it.
Yeah, yeah.
Or maybe that's just made up.
But it may be true based on the fact that fertility was such a huge problem and the mortality rate for babies was extremely high for many reasons.
Yeah, you know, prenatal vitamins or any warning against drinking alcohol or staying hydrated or eating good and healthy food in abundance because now you're eating for two.
Well, the lack of a licensed medical professional.
And probably just a general lack of education might have had a lot to do with it as well.
I'd say all of the above.
You're just a peasant out in the country, you know.
You're pregnant as all hell.
Your water breaks.
The nearest neighbor capable of delivering your child is Carl Childers from Sling Blade, played by our favorite Billy Bob Thornton.
Carl, they say you're a whiz on those pigs and lawnmowers and things.
I like them frank fried potatoes.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah. Me too.
In areas such as Greece, women would drink men's blood because they thought it would improve their relationships.
You know, that always works, Coop.
My question is, whose blood?
The husband's?
And where did they get it?
I mean, it just says, drink men's blood.
Like, which men?
Yeah, I'm not sure about that, but I would think it would have to have been their partner's blood and, you know, how they would get it beyond me.
But, you know, maybe it was an agreed-upon thing.
Well, I mean, yeah.
I mean, during those times, bloodletting was kind of a common medical practice.
So, sure, they'd just collect the blood in a jar and probably just sip on it, I guess.
Actually, now that you mention it, in the 16th century, a German-Swiss doctor by the name of Paracelsus thought that human blood was great for drinking.
Wait. The same Paracelsus that believed that mercury, lead, arsenic, and antimony were all safe for medical uses as well?
The one and only.
And antimony, by the way, is found in nature, but is usually taken from the ores, a stibnite, and get this valentanite.
So that's kind of serendipitous.
Oh, valentanite.
Wow. So how'd that blood drinking go?
It was a hit, but they actually preferred their blood cooked.
Like little blood patties, I guess.
Gross. Yeah, they even have recipes that survive today.
And one of those recipes is for a marmalade created by a Franciscan apothecary.
Do you know what the preservation room is for?
Delicious jams and jellies?
Mmm, let's see how we did.
That's good.
Oh boy.
Well, I bet that is full of iron.
Great to fight fatigue, which I'm sure they could use to toil in their dirty fields because of all the drought and famine.
You know, so good.
And get this.
Human blood was thought to cure a whole gambit of diseases and ailments, from epilepsy to just having an overall better feeling about yourself.
It was so popular that everyone was chasing after a few spoonfuls.
But there was a big problem.
Blood wasn't cheap.
Typically. Only those of some sort of wealth could afford the top-shelf apothecary blood blends.
So what do the poor do, you ask?
Well, here's a hint.
We know that there were a number of public executions occurring during the Middle Ages, and one method was through the use of the guillotine.
You see, the practitioners saw a lucrative business opportunity that was too good to be true.
Too good, in fact.
That they were nearly losing their heads over the prophets rolling in.
Oh, you didn't.
Not only could they bring home their own jars of fresh blood to their children and wives, they could also sell this same blood to the jeering crowds that flooded the streets.
They would go up and collect blood into whatever containers that they had.
And I wonder, the Valentine's Saints, they were beheaded, right?
I wonder if the people went up and drank their blood.
Interesting fact.
It's said that the blood from men was much better than the blood from women.
Well, who would have guessed?
Yeah, and guess how long people would think that drinking other humans' blood was a miracle medicine.
I'm gonna say 18...
No, 19...
No, 2...
2022. The day Elizabeth...
The reptilian queen died.
Dropping bombshells.
She only lived as long as she did because she drank the blood of young children.
It's a fact.
Look it up.
Everybody knows that.
Hey, man.
I agree.
But people would drink human blood believing it to have medicinal properties well into the 19th century.
And it's believed that Denmark was the last country to dabble in that practice.
You know they're still doing it, bro.
Could be.
Oh, damn.
What's up?
Licorice. The Danish are famous for their licorice.
Hold on, let me look this up.
Why do Danish love licorice?
Well, it says here that Linda, a Danish woman, says, quote, we need licorice to get our blood pressure up and heat in our bodies, end quote.
Oh, wow.
See, I told you.
You can't quit millennia-old habits just like that.
The brain is hardwired.
Well, I will be damned.
So moving on.
People in France and England associated February 14th with the start of the mating season for birds.
And it's said that a woman could tell what type of man that she would marry by the kind of bird that she would first spot on Valentine's Day.
So if you wanted to be with a priest, you better hope to see a blackbird.
Who the hell wants to be with a priest, man?
That's gotta be boring.
If you wanted a gentle, kind, loving man, you'd better hope to see a dove.
And if you wanted a humorous fellow, a real jester, you'd better hope to spot a bluebird.
Okay, nope.
Who the hell wants to be with a jester?
With their multicolored three-pronged hat things, little bells on the ends, and their weird poofy trouser shorts, and those curly-toed wooden clogs, like little...
Blow horns on their noses.
Nobody wants to have sex with that.
I mean, come on, man.
Well, did you know that King Martin of Aragon laughed himself to death after hearing a joke from his favorite jester named Bora?
The joke went like this.
What is something that has never occurred since time immemorial?
Answer? A young woman did not fart in her husband's lap.
Well... I see why King Aragon died.
Well, that most likely was not the joke, but it is said to be the oldest recorded joke, which dates back to 1900 BC.
And the oldest British joke, apparently, is a 10th century joke that goes like this.
What hangs at a man's thigh and wants to poke the hole that it's often poked before?
Okay. Okay.
Okay. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
And I see why King Aragon died.
If you wanted a wealthy guy, you would want to see a goldfinch.
And if you wanted no man at all, you better hope to see a woodpecker.
Okay, first of all, was everyone an ornithologist, for Christ's sake?
I mean, clearly you needed to know your birds, or else you wouldn't know anything about the man that you'd be with.
And that seemed to be a pretty important facet of this entire thing.
And secondly...
Yeah, Glendale.
No, not Sonic.
Yep, Amy Rose is single on Valentine's Day.
Perhaps she can put her name in an urn and go get flagellated with strips of bloody goatskin.
Or see a woodpecker.
The women would also put sage on their pillows and even put a slice of cake underneath.
That's messy, dude.
But you know, even in the Middle Ages, so like 500 to around 1500 AD, people were still pulling each other's names out of some type of bowl or box to see who their valentine would be.
And they would attach that name to their sleeve for a week.
Wear your heart on your sleeve.
So very cool, man.
Yeah, man.
Pretty cool stuff.
And then, you know, here we are coming up on the start of a new Lupercalia.
Yes, but for the listeners, they won't hear this until after the end of Lupercalia, so...
Right? Yeah.
But for us, you and I, Lupercalia is only just beginning, so let the festivities begin!
So, you know, let's get naked.
Get ready to laugh out loud while running through our city streets, slapping women with bloody strips of skin ripped from freshly sacrificed dogs and goats.
I don't know about you, but I've been naked this whole time, Coop.
Good to know.
It's all in the name of love and fertility.
And apparently, at age seven in ancient Rome, you were considered of sound mind and liable to be executed if given such a sentence.
Whoa! Seven years old and about to get your head cut off.
Maybe they were just way more advanced back then than we are now.
I also read that Romulus, the founder of Rome, had decreed that no child could be killed before his third year, unless he was deformed.
And the quote-unquote deformity could be as little as simply being an unwanted child, or being homeless, or maybe the parents wanted a girl instead of a boy, or vice versa, or maybe, just maybe, they were in fact physically deformed.
But, who knows?
Yeah, it's like all these other reasons why you could have this child killed and all reasons other than actually being physically deformed.
Yeah, physically deformed isn't even mentioned, but it's just like circumstances mainly.
People are like, I didn't want him!
I'm like, okay, well, kill him.
It's so nuts.
You're said to be deformed if you were simply just homeless, a homeless child.
Yeah, that's messed up, dude.
Crazy, like, I just wonder what brought that around, you know, like the mind space of the times.
Well, that will be it for this week's episode.
We hope you enjoyed it.
It was very short notice, and we felt like we should do something for Valentine's Day.
time's day and we didn't know anything about it so we decided no why not yeah you know it was a fun little rabbit hole of information so thanks for following us down that and so please uh come back next week where we will begin our journey into a mysterious wilderness in the far north of canada
a place only accessible by airplane hiking or taking a boat upriver for many days it's a place where strange human-like cannibals live in vast cave systems where evil spirits lie in wait it's a place where many a man
has been found.
Wow, scary.
That's right.
We're going to venture into the Nahanni Valley, or better known as Headless Valley, or Valley of the Headless Men.
Wow. I can't wait.
Damn. Yeah, it should be pretty good.
But before we head out...
We're going to give you a list of sources for today's episode.
Sources come from catholic.org, plato.stanford.edu, bibleinterp.arizona.edu, asc.upenn.edu, ncbi.nlm.nih.gov,
smithsonianmeg.com, oxfordre.com, history.co.uk,
Britannica.com, EarlyChristianWritings.com, MentalFloss.com, Wikipedia.com, and Medievalists.net.
Well, until then, people, buckle up, use your blinkers, and make sure you turn your brights off when you're driving at night and there's oncoming traffic.
Also, don't forget to like, share, and subscribe to the Paranautica Podcast.
Email us at paranautica at gmail.com.
That's P-A-R-A-N-A-U-G-H-T-I-C-A at gmail.com and follow us over at Twitter at Paranautica.
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