Sympathy Card Etiquette - it should be taught at school

I went out today to find a sympathy card for an aquaintance who just lost her father. I wasn't sure whether or not to send one, seeing as I haven't seen or spoken to her since high school, but I resolved that, putting aside what was socially correct, it felt right to me to do so.

It was a new experience for me, and can I just express my utter disgust with the whole business of sympathy card making? You want to get creative with Birthday cards and over-the-hill jokes? Fine. But when it comes to sympathy - the vaguer the better.

The thing about sympathy, unlike birthdays, is you can't really make the card yourself. It isn't thoughtful in the way that making a b-day card is thougtful. It's just cheap -- unless of course you're one of those scrapbooking crazies (actually I shouldn't knock them, I completely plan on becoming one later in life). So you have to buy one, you have to ponderously look through everything that Shopper's Drug Mart has on offer, and pick the one that doesn't make you sound like a complete knob. Like maybe, despite the retard who wrote these words for me, I actually am sorry to hear about your loss. It's a rather frustrating exercise.
These things are horrendous. They start out okay, the blanket "In Deepest Sympathy" opener... but then they get DEEPLY smarmy, or worse, they get utterly condescending, and then some... and I really couldn't believe this when I read it... some of them.... RHYME.
I didn't have a pen handy but dear god it went something like this:

At the loss of one so dear
It helps to know
Caring thoughts are near

Although at times it's hard to bear
Dear friend blah-de-blah
You're in my prayers.

Rhyming sympathy? Rhyming is contrived, which makes the sympathy sound contrived, and isn't that what you're trying to avoid? Come on people. Sympathy requires, you know, tact?
Don't even get me started on the religious aspect.
So I stood there, madly rifling through the cards, sure that there was one that I'd missed. One that didn't have an embossed lily, or an ANGEL, or a grassy field; one that didn't use the words love, prayers, memories, soul, or comfort; one that just said "In Deepest Sympathy" and then SHUT THE FUCK UP!

Alas, such a one does not exist. However, should I ever be in a situation to receive such cards, I hope that I remember this, and realize that the people who sent them, no matter how crappy their luck in card lingo, really do care.