Life has been good lately.

I navigated with aplomb the unholy trifecta of Christmas-New Year’s-Valentine’s Day. There are months yet to go until Chinese Valentine’s Day—the seventh day of the seventh month of the lunar calendar (July 31 this year, in case you’re interested). For weeks now, my existence has been untroubled by holidays. Restaurant reservations are easy to obtain. My pockets are thick with extra discretionary cash.

So you can imagine my shock Sunday at dinner when Current Interest casually announced, “It’s Valentine’s Day on Tuesday.”

I nearly choked on a forkful of salad. “Shit!” I said. “There’s three Valentine’s Days?”

Where had the third come from? And, more urgently, what was I obligated to buy?

My mind began to chew on the problem: I had to work Monday from 9 to 9. After that the only non-convenience stores open were in the night market. Nothing good could come of a night market Valentine’s Day gift. Nor from 7-11 chocolate.

But she explained that March 14 is White Day, a Japanese Valentine’s Day, when women reciprocate the affection they received the previous month. She wondered if she might cook me dinner in my apartment on Tuesday night. In other words, I was out of danger.

In a moment of boredom this afternoon, I looked up White Day and discovered that she has the whole thing backwards. Valentine’s Day is the day, according to the first and only source I could be bothered to read, that Japanese women summon up the courage to declare themselves to the objects of their admiration. A month later, their men demonstrate passionate and undying ardor in the usual way: flowers and candy.

This information comes far too late. I’ve already tidied my apartment, and she apparently spent a few hours yesterday practicing how to boil spaghetti. The event will go on as planned.