Mitt Romney's technique for blowing out candles may haunt your nightmares

The video starts out sweet: Mitt Romney's staffers surprise him with a Twinkie cake for his 72nd birthday.

But Romney quickly drew mockery and even outrage on social media for how he blew out his candles — lifting them out of the cake one by one and extinguishing them individually.

"These are all wishes I'm getting," Romney says in the video posted on Twitter, plucking the candles from the cake. "All these wishes."

People were quick to pounce on Romney's post.

"This is the most bizarre technique for blowing out birthday candles that I’ve ever witnessed," tweeted writer Bradford Pearson. "Mitt Romney is a deeply weird dude."

"Just think if this had surfaced during the 2012 election," pondered Julie Davis of The New York Times. "'New video of Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney extinguishing birthday candles by removing them 1 by 1 from his cake and blowing on them individually has raised new questions...'"

"How do you not know how to blow out candles? It’s distressing, Mitt," Roxane Gay chimed in, replying to Romney's original post.

"Senator, you’re supposed to blow them out all together — not one at time. Happy birthday, Mitt!" said former Tennessee congressional candidate Christopher J. Hale.

Others defended Romney, pointing out that his way is more sanitary.

"he's doing that so he doesn't get his spit all over the cake because everyone in the office is going to eat it." wrote Twitter user Zainab. "I cant believe I'm defending mitt romney's candle blowing antics. but here we are. my current job has truly broken me."

For his part, Romney said he was trying to spare others his germs.

"I have a bit of a cold and I didn't want to spray my germs all over the Twinkies for everybody else to eat!" he told TMZ.

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