Valentine’s Day is a time for exchanging sweet nothings and terms of endearment. It is an occasion for sharing candlelit meals and opening romantic gifts. It is an opportunity for igniting new sparks or basking in the warmth of comfortable, memory-filled long-term relationships.

But certain phrases can be a real “buzz kill,” putting you in an awkward position, creeping you out or making you want to look around for the nearest exit.

My wife and I could very well spend Valentine’s Day evening watching recorded episodes of “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” That long-running CW improv show often has hilarious sketches in which the performers must brainstorm things like “Things You Wouldn’t Want To Hear In (Insert Situation).”

With that in mind, I’ve assigned my researchers to pull together an assortment of the questions most likely to make a shambles of your Valentine’s Day:

• “Agreed, dear, Valentine’s Day is the ultimate ‘date night’ and — hey, isn’t that the babysitter on TV in that white Bronco?”

• “Do you think this dress would make my sister’s butt look fat?”

• “Do you ever get the feeling that we knew each other in a past life?’ and did I manage to keep my sexual orientation secret from you that time, too? D’oh!”

• “Don’t you think the three most beautiful words in the English language are ‘Dutch treat, baby’?”

• “Just thinking out loud, would one of your kidneys go with that offer of your heart?”

• “I wonder if the eye color of your steak was the same captivating color as your own eyes?”

• “When the TV announcer said my ex-beau won the lottery, they didn’t happen to flash a telephone number on the screen, did they?”

• “Don’t you agree that a marriage certificate is just a piece of paper… like jury duty summonses, restraining orders, eviction notices…?”
(…)

• “I’m sorry — did you say, ‘have children’ or ‘halve children,’ not that there’s anything wrong with that?”

• “Don’t you think the Whitman’s Sampler lid would be even more useful if it supplied information on which chocolates I’ve already licked?”

• “Uh, would it spoil your mood if I told you that when Cupid started firing his arrows, I exercised my ‘stand your ground’ rights?”

• “When you were little, did you have fanciful daydreams about being royalty, or did you have more realistic ambitions like, I don’t know, getting sucked into the Witness Protection Program by falling for some poor schmuck you met on a blind date?”

• “Isn’t it amazing how the Conversation Hearts candy seems to be speaking directly to me? You don’t have duct tape and a sledge hammer in your car trunk, do you?”

• “Oh, you mean I was supposed to ‘swipe left’ if I thought someone was a gross loser?”

• “Don’t you think ‘love at first sight’ is overblown, unless you go straight to the telephoto lens, I mean…”

• “Did you notice that this wine goes down all metal-y and diamond-y?”

Of course, some jarring questions come as part of a “two-for-one” offer. For instance, “Now the medication the veterinarian prescribed for the dog’s mange was the little blue pill, wasn’t it?”, followed by “Hey, who broke the table leg???”

 

Danny Tyree welcomes email responses at tyreetyrades@aol.com and visits to his Facebook fan page “Tyree’s Tyrades.”