I just want to drop a quick note about a site I literally stumbled across last night. JoeConsumer.com is a consumer awareness/advocacy site that gives advice from mortgage broker’s dirty little tricks to how to make your complaints heard and acted upon. A lot of consumers are either unaware of the risks they take with their money, credit and time, or they settle for less than acceptable service because they don’t know how to fight back. The folks over at JoeConsumer tell you how. It’s a good site to stay up to date on, and I’d even recommend subscribing to their RSS feed so you don’t miss a post!

• 5% of U.S. women send themselves flowers on Valentine’s Day.
• 64 percent of United States men do not make plans in advance for a romantic Valentine’s Day with their sweethearts.
• Chocolate manufacturers currently use 40 percent of the world’s almonds and 20 percent of the world’s peanuts.
• Approximately 110 million roses, the majority red, will be sold and delivered within a three-day time period.
• About 3% of pet owners will give Valentine’s Day gifts to their pets.
• About 1 billion Valentine’s Day cards are exchanged each year. That’s the largest seasonal card-sending occasion of the year, next to Christmas.
• The Duke of Orleans sent the oldest known Valentine in 1415 A.D. to his French wife while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London. It is still on display in a museum in England.
  -Everything Valentine’s Day
• Another claim says the tradition goes back to a Christian martyr, St. Valentine, executed in Rome by Claudious II around 470 A.D.
• A third claim says the first recorded association of Valentine’s Day with romantic love is in a poem by Geoffrey Chaucer written in 1382.
  -Wikipedia
• The Italian city of Verona, where Shakespeare’s lovers Romeo and Juliet lived, receives about 1,000 letters addressed to Juliet every Valentine’s Day.
• Teachers will receive the most Valentine’s Day cards, followed by children, mothers, wives, and then, sweethearts.
• Chicago’s post office rejected more than 25,000 cards during the late 1800s, on the grounds that they were so indecent that they were not fit to be carried through the U.S.. mail. This was an era when racy valentine’s cards were very popular.
• Condom sales are highest around Valentine’s Day which are 20 percent to 30 percent higher than usual.
  -Durex Condom Manufacturers
• Hallmark employs an 80-person research staff to analyze the sales pattern of previous Valentine’s Day.
  -Wisebread.
• The per capita consumption of candy by Americans in 2006 is 26 pounds.
  -U.S. Census Bureau Current Industrial Reports for 2006
• There were also 21,335 florists in the U.S. in 2005 employing 101,861 people.
• Both Texas and Nebraska are homes to cities named “Valentine”