by Mark Chalifoux

July 11 is National Cheer Up The Lonely Day and you would be hard-pressed to find a more condescending holiday. The most depressing part of this holiday is reserved for anyone who gets an unexpected card or call, because that’s when you truly learn how lonely you are. It’s probably not unlike how you can make someone mad by repeatedly asking them if they are mad. However, if you’re the holier-than-thou type, here are some great ways to cheer up lonely people.

• Follow them on Twitter and give them a framed copy of the email about following them on Twitter.
• Give them a homemade coupon book for Facebook likes and status shares to be used at their discretion.
• Talk to them on the phone for one hour. Tell them you just wanted to catch up and as soon as your stopwatch hits 60 minutes, hang up. There are plenty of other people who need your help.
• Take them to a nursing home to show them there is a future even for lonely people.
• Remind them that no cat lady is a lonely cat lady. Offer to make them a “starter cat” by cutting their hair with your car keys and sculpting it into a feline shape.
• Encourage them to do charity work. Use your interaction with them and how good it makes you feel as a person as an example of the benefits.
• Tell them that ghosts are real, so they are never really alone.
• If dealing with an old girlfriend, tell her she’s never really as alone as she thinks she is (and then wink and walk away).
• Tell them about the origins of the holiday. Apparently, someone named Francis Pesek created the holiday to promote kindness towards others who were forgotten. He chose July 11 because it was his birthday. Nothing says “selfless” like trying to make your own birthday a national holiday.
• Give them an Xbox. Kids LOVE talking trash to people while they destroy them in video games so at least it’s some sort of human interaction.
• Sign them up for every free magazine you can.
• Remind them that plenty of famous people were loners. Adolf Hitler was a famous loner, the Unabomber lived in a cabin BY HIMSELF for years and Osama Bin Laden never left his house in Pakistan for years until he passed away.
• Tell them to make a political donation because then they will receive phone calls for the rest of their life.
• Make sure they know how much it hurts to have a broken heart in an effort to convince them being loved is overrated anyway.
• Sit down with the person and spend 15 minutes pointing out their flaws and make sweeping judgments about their life so they start to appreciate being lonely.

Mark Chalifoux is a contributing writer to Man Cave Daily and you can help him feel less lonely by sending him an email mark.chalifoux@gmail.com or following him on Twitter @MarkChalifoux.

Still feeling alone? Cheer yourself up with some food and dark humor in our Recipes for the Lonely. –>