Hey everyone! This week’s pre-Valentine’s day BEST WEEKEND BETS are, as always, hand selected from BYT ALL CITY and carefully calibrated for maximum fun and minimum stress, and will be punctuated with inspirational images of Julia Roberts in PRETTY WOMAN, because if we’re going to feed into romantic delusion over the next few days, we may as well learn from the best. Consider this your fair warning: shit’s about to get C.U.T.E.

A COUPLE OF PSAs before we start:

• WE HAVE ALL SORTS OF USEFUL VALENTINE’S DAY STORIES: DATE OUTFITS+OUTINGS photo shoot, our PRO-TIPS Survival guide, the best chocolate in DC round up AND tomorrow-we have a very special holiday cupcake surprise for you, so make sure to keep and eye out for it.
• OUR WINTER GUIDES ARE UP. Enjoy: FILM + MUSIC + THEATRE + FOOD+ STYLE . YES
• Read up on food here, our amazing movie reviews are here, STYLE Licks can be found here, and as always, GAY Best Weekend Bets are coming right up.

OK, ready for the weekend now?

THURSDAY

• a sprinkling of (free admission) culture to kick things off:
• take a very long lunch and catch the La Mystere Picasso screening @ National Gallery of Art
• or-skip out of work in time to make it to the Millenium Stage for the 6pm performance of “THE GREATEST SONGS YOU NEVER HEARD” or catch a screening of the Charlie Chaplin classic“MODERN TIMES” @ The Kogod Courtyard of the American Art Museum/National Portrait Gallery at 7pm. TALK ABOUT QUALITY DATE OPTIONS HERE.
• hit on cute girls in cute outfits @ Treasury’s shopping+cake party
• foodie alert: the 13th International Food & Wine Festival is taking place ALL WEEKEND LONG.
• shows! Summer Camp and Gigamesh are @ U Street Music Hall. Yeah!
• afterwards: Trevor Martin and Sharkey are DJing @ Blackbyrd which should prove to be a perfect Thursday night low pressure dancing/romancing scenario
• also! this is your LAST WEEKEND to catch LA CAGE AUX FOLLES (and George Harmilton’s immortal tan in it) @ The Kennedy Center so plan accordingly
• + other stuff

FRIDAY

• wake up and buy yourself some concert tickets: everything from Madonna to Miike Snow to Chairlift goes on sale this week and you can check out our handy guide with an even handier Spotify playlist to lead you through it all here.
• ALSO-TODAY WE WILL BE GIVING SPECIAL VALENTINE’S DAY CUPCAKES FROM A BUNCH OF OUR FAVORITE BAKERIES IN DC – SO CHECK IN AT 9AM FOR A CHANCE TO WIN.
• swing into the spirit of Valentine’s Day things with an evening that starts with Maison Francaise’s annual romantic soiree to celebrate the occasion.
• then: there is a secret party at a secret location with Navbox and Chris Nitti-and we know how much you like secret parties at secret locations, so we figured we should let you know about this one.
• theatre option for tonight: the hipsterific Two Gentlemen of Verona @ Shakespeare Theatre Co. (remember: if you’re under 35, tickets are only $15)
• dancing to the songs you know and love: Mousetrap is @ Black Cat
• and Strathmore’s Friday Night Eclectic features The Grey Area this week.
• worth a trip to Baltimore: BIG FREEDIA!
• + other stuff

SATURDAY

• if you read our Emily Wall story this week about optimizing your minimized closet (and if you didn’t-you should) you’re probably ready to purge all the unnecessary things out of our wardrobe and invest in some classy signature pieces. Lucky for you-there is several awesome shopping events happening:
• Gilt City has their annual warehouse sale @ Long View Gallery and from a more DIY angle BYT favorites BUTLER + CLAYPOOL are hosting a last-min pop-up shop @ CORK market. Half of my cocktail dress selection comes from these ladies so-come prepared to spend.
• After that-indulge in the romantic explosion taking over Georgetown – click here for details because it is almost too much for me to process in a bullet point.
• then, at 5pm: a HEARTBREAK Ball/bboy battle takes place @ St. Stephens Church
• and if you’re in the mood for a different kind (read: way fancier) of a Valentine’s day ball-check out this Masquerade operation put on by Art Soiree
• shows wise: most stuff seems to be sold out tonight BUT! DC9 turns 8 years old with a special and bound-to-be-awesome show by STAR SLINGER and  STEVE AOKI and DATSIK  are @ Fillmore,
• drag queen aside: ELECTILE DYSFUNCTION @ Theater J IS hilarious
• + other stuff

SUNDAY

• Now, we all know what I’m going to say here: MOVIE DAY!
• “The Vow” opens today and features a shirtless Channing Tatum and an amnesiac Rachel McAdams (full review coming tomorrow, in case you’re dying to read it) so that’s probably going to be your most obvious pre-Valentine’s day bet.
• But-if you want to take a road less traveled here-catch the matinee of the Humphrey Bogart/Katherine Hepburn classic “African Queen” @ AFI.
• in the mood to eat and shop instead of watch movies: One Love Massive and BYT’s favorite alcoholic cake purveyors Crunkcakes are joining forces for a special TREAT YO SELF Valentine’s day pop-up shop.
• For sushi lovers: STICKY RICE is hosting their annual STICKY RICE IRON CHEF CONTEST featuring competition between all of their chefs, $1 PBRs and more. GO.
• SHOWS WISE-Die Antwoord is sold out (if you have NOT read Cale’s interview with them-trust me, you HAVE TO) but DUM DUM GIRLS tickets are still available and VICE is throwing a party @ DC9 to promote the new movie PROJECT X.
• plus: L’Enfant Cafe launches their Speak Easy Cabaret/supper club series tonight
• You’ll sleep some other time.
• + other stuff

REMEMBER: THERE ARE A BAJILLION OTHER THINGS TO DO LISTED IN BYT ALL CITY, so use it (to both post your events and search for them) and if you think we may have missed something, comment away–you know you want to.

and as a parting note: