1. In the weeks leading up to Valentine's Day, gold jewelry sales generate 34 million tons of mine waste.
2. Red roses emit about 9,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide on this very special day.
3. Oh yeah, and these mass quantities of red roses are shipped from South Africa, which wastes fossil fuel.
Roses are generally grown in warmer climates, so each year, we fly millions of roses across the ocean, using fossil fuel for refrigeration tanks (not to mention refrigerant gasses are also harmful to the environment).
4. Studies sadly continue to suggest that Valentine's Day is "nationally, the time with the highest rate of suicide."
Diane Brice, the director of Suicide Prevention Service of the Central Coast, says the "expectation" to be in love, or feel better, often intensifies depressive thoughts.
5. Other polls find many young adults admit to having negative and depressive feelings on Feb. 14.
6. BREAKING: Valentine's Day is a commercial holiday.
7. Let's break these numbers down:
Last year...
• Americans sent 150 billion cards to help express themselves.
• the average consumer shelled out about $131 toward the holiday (it's the highest average in 11 years),
• total spending was expected to reach $18.6 billion.
• greeting cards were the most common gifts (making up 54.7%), followed by candy (51%), flowers (36.6%), and an evening out (36.2%).
8. One origin of the holiday credits the ancient Roman festival "Lupercalia," which celebrated spring by pairing off women with men by lottery.
9. But wait. It gets darker: Tradition called for men to sacrifice a goat and a dog, then whip their women with the hides of the animals they had just slain.
10. Some holiday companies have lovey-dovey sentiments all figured out, apparently.
Before Valentine's Day 2006, Hallmark employed an 80-person staff to analyze previous sales patterns against hundreds of thousands of customer reviews, focus groups, and general in-store observations to create thousands of new cards that conjure precise sentiments.
11. A dozen long-stemmed red roses can be marked up to $75 around this time of year.
12. According to the U.S. Trade Census, the total value of fresh-cut roses imported for this year's V-Day is $354,703,231.
The country is prepared.
13. The inundation of commercials puts tremendous pressure on men to deliver.
14. The condom industry rakes in more money than ever on and around Valentine's Day.
15. So do at-home pregnancy tests.
Usually around March sales see a spike.
16. BONUS: Did you know...
You could celebrate the sentiments and observances of Valentine's Day on any other 364 days of the year?
All the love without the stuff. Right?