Look, we're gonna tell it like it is right off the bat: The best relationship-ending gift is herpes. Though it will rid you of your annoying significant other, it begins another lifelong, kinky ménage à trios between you, your pharmacist, and a science project called Valtrex™. With only mild side-effects like headaches, nausea, and abdominal pain (uh, so we're told), it sounds like less of a pain in the snatch than being in a relationship. Plus, it'll never, ever leave you.
But enough about Rihanna's parting gift to Chris Brown. Valentine's Day is around the corner, and if you're in an unhappy relationship, it's the worst time of year. But we have your solution: a quick little list of gifts all but guaranteed to start a fight of epic magnitude. You could save your money and just dump the jerk already. But if you're looking for the coward's way out, go ahead and pick up one of these "gifts" today.
Workout tape
Here's a handy SAT analogy to help you understand this one. Fill in the blank.
Workout tapes : gifts :: Black Eyed Peas : ________
A) Music
B) Art
C) Entertainment
D) Humanity
E) All of the above
The answer, of course, is E. Workout
tapes are among the worst gifts you can give, right down there with
Black Eyed Peas merchandise. You might as
well write your lover a letter stating, "I don't find you attractive anymore,
and by the way your breath is terrible." If you're gifting one of these,
go for the gold -- get a VHS of a D-list '90s celebrity, like,
for example, LaToya Jackson. Were you aware she had a workout tape? Better question: Was anyone in the Jackson family aware she had a workout tape?
Getting
your partner anything related to fitness is tricky, unless
they've expressed an interest in the past. An example of this
phenomenon is Crossfit membership. If they've posted any status updates
about how they're dying to try this hot new fad that no one seems to shut the
fuck up about on Facebook, a Crossfit membership will be taken as a token of love, not disgust. But an aerobics video starring the mom from Step by Step? That's the ticket.
Gift cards
Gift
cards are stupid gifts in general. They have all the flexibility of
store credit, and all the drawbacks of knowing some asshole put you
through the misery of forcing you to shop at a specific store rather
than giving you workable currency and saying, "Here, buy something you actually want." Here's
something you'll never hear at Starbucks if you're paying with cash: "Sorry sir, we can't accept that because it's a Circuit City gift
card and that company went bankrupt years ago."
To add insult to injury, give your un-beloved a gift card to a store they probably wouldn't even like
because you were too indecisive to pick something out. It's not in the
deposition, but we're willing to bet Lorena Bobbitt sliced off her husband's cock because he got her a gift card to Things
Remembered. And then she gave him a thing to remember her by.
Random smelly thing
Going
to Bath & Body Works for a gift is something you do when you're
given a Secret Santa at work. It's not the sort of thing you do for
someone you know intimately. The same thing goes for any
woman who buys her man Drakkar Noir or any of the other shit they sell
at Navarro. This may not immediately end your relationship, but
it's enough of a sign that you don't give a crap about the other person
that they'll put it in their memory banks and bring it up during your
next big fight.
A gift that's really for yourself
"Sweetheart, I got you this 60-inch flatscreen television with the NFL Sunday Ticket
package and all the premium channels from every country with a vowel in
it. I know your studio apartment is only 450 square feet but I figured you
can keep it at my house." Now you're free of that nagging romantic attachment, and you have a new TV -- two gifts in one.
Women are the biggest culprits of this technique. What, you disagree? All right, lady, think about the
last time you bought some lingerie and
then told your man "I got you something" as you slipped on some lacy
black thing. Your man does not give a crap about a piece of cloth he can't wait to rip
off your body. It's not for him, ladies, it's for you. If your boyfriend
brought home a banana hammock for Valentine's Day and said, "This is
for you, baby" as he strapped it on and his pubes stuck out from the
side like cartoon smell lines, would you believe him?
No gift
"Sweetie,
you don't need to get me anything for Valentine's Day." That's the modern
Trojan Horse of dating. This trap consumes relationships faster than
Newt Gingrich consumes the souls of inner-city black children trying to stay
alive. It's an elaborate test first created by Whorey McWhorestein, an Irish Jew with an unfortunate name, for the sole purpose
of starting conflict in relationships. Women who employ this technique
have some sort of extra masochistic chromosome which lets them take pleasure in saying the complete opposite of what they
mean and requiring their man to read between the lines.
The only time "no gift" is the proper gift is if the female is in a situation like the Keanu Reeves blockbuster Speed
where if the guy gets the girl a gift, a bus full of people (and Sandra
Bullock) explodes. Even then, she'll still give the guy shit about how
he doesn't love her enough that he put the well-being of strangers over
her emotional stability. So if you're trying to turn your lady into an ex, you've gotta fully commit. When she gets angry at you for not getting her a gift, call her a liar and storm off in a huff. Should do the trick.
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