Why you should spend Valentine’s Day with your best friend

Some of you will call me a cynic, some of you will call me sad, some of you might even call me a less attractive version of Conor Maynard. Unfortunately, none of these are true.

What is true, though, is the fact that spending February 14th with your BFF is the best thing about Valentine’s Day.

For the past four years, minus the last two which I actually spent third wheeling, I’ve spent V Day with my best mate – and it’s been both tragic and magical.

Her mum loves me

We’ve done it all. From watching the best film of all time, Bridget Jones, to making our own Harlem Shake video, sharing this special day with your bestie is the way forward, not only for you singletons who already know the intense cocktail of socially suicidal embarrassment and pure joy, but for everyone.

Forget the gifts, cards and the ever-so-mainstream meal for two at any chain restaurant of your choosing. Oh wait, you already did? Well don’t worry because that’s not what being best mates is about. Today isn’t about impressing your partner – you haven’t even got one. Instead your only worry is having a sick time and making sure that you absolutely do not cry one single tear.

You can go out

Possibly the best part about spending Valentine’s together is spending the next day together as well, obviously hungover. This is the one thing that couples cannot flaunt in your face, unlike their new Michael Kors watch. A night on the lash, just the two of you: classic. A night on the lash, with your boyfriend/girlfriend: weird.

Just the two of us

Laughing about who got with the biggest freak, flashing your tits for free kebab meat and the regret of garlic mayo the next day are the spoils only enjoyed by the free and the single. While the couples are tucked up in bed with their new love, holding in their farts, we’ll be shuffling in a dirty warehouse.

Plus she’s staying at mine afterwards, so we can live safe in the knowledge that pulling isn’t on the cards for either of us, like it would be anyway.

There are no boundaries

It’s cheaper

“Can we pay on two separate cards?” you ask the waiter, carelessly. It doesn’t matter if you can’t because you’re already reciting your card details to your mate across the table. They’re transferring you what they owe without a second thought. None of this, “Don’t worry, I’ve got this”, or “You can get the next round!” nonsense. You need your money for more important things, like alcohol.

Free Woo Woos

Make sure that you take full advantage of the deals bars have on offer for lovers and never look back, definitely don’t look into each other’s eyes. Nothing enriches your time together like unashamedly downing discounted bevs.

What is an expensive evening spent with your loving partner for most is replaced with getting off your face on Lambrini and leftover spirits from past house parties, freeing up your budget for more important things like a taxi home when you’ve lost the ability to walk or even stand up.

Or you can just minesweep

You can treat yourself

A Valentine’s with your best friend doesn’t and shouldn’t have to be completely alcohol-based. One of the best parts about not having a significant other to splash the cash on, is that you can spend it on yourself instead. You treat yourselves separately, but together.

“You need, and deserve to spend £25 on a phone case that looks like an Etcha-Sketch”, “That’s only the third pair of trainers you’ve bought today of course that isn’t too many!”

Yes, this sounds completely over the top – but how are other people meant to love you if you don’t love yourself?

New outfit – £110. Feeling swag – Priceless.

Neither of you have other plans

Of course you’re spending the day together, spending it alone is just sad. A whole afternoon sat inside watching the Frozen Planet boxset does not qualify as an acceptable excuse to be busy.  Just like washing her hair doesn’t mean she can’t pencil you in within the next 6-8 hours.

It’s tradition now, so you know to plan ahead. You don’t take a love interest past Radio 1’s transfer deadline day just so you’re still single to spend the day with your bezzie mate. You may end up alone with no children, but it’s definitely worth it.

It’s your best friend

Why would you not want to? You know what each other love and especially hate, like onions or most people you went to school with.

They’re always there to get you dressed when you’re hungover and you’ll always be there to clean the sick out of the phone charger and you wouldn’t have it any other way.

6 months apart xx

Cast off the stigma of being single on Valentine’s Day – just be single with somebody else.