I mean, stop doing all of the work. Occupy yourself with activities that make you happy (sports, music, philately) and while you dabble in online possibilities, don't be so eager.

The LW has been involved with men in three categories, all unsatisfying: loser 50-somethings, user 30-somethings, and married men of whatever age. The common denominator is that she is settling for what she thinks she can get.

Why do you think this is all you deserve?

I took the journey from an emotionally bereft marriage through two years of online dating of men who didn't offer much. Sure, they took me to fancy dinners, but that turns out to be very unimportant. When I finally met a man who treated me with love and kindness, it was a shock to the system, but I've managed to learn that this is what I deserved all along.

So do you.

It's an insult that CW replaced the fabulous, female-empowering show "Veronica Mars" with the whoring see-donkeys (good choice of words) of the Pussycat Dolls. I want my teenage detective back!

As someone who started singing around the campfire as a kid, and did all the choral stuff for years, I decided to be a lawyer instead of a musician because it seemed the more "important" career. After 15 years practicing law, and 10 years writing, I am now enrolled in a grad program as a vocalist. It's exciting to get really good at something new at the age of 51. I'm unusual in that I have the means to do so at this stage in life.

So I know it can be done.

My concern with the LW is not that he can't pick up an instrument (or start singing -- cheap and doable if you can hear the pitches) at this point. It's that I'm not sure he will get from music what he imagines he will. He seems to have romanticized it as something which will fulfill him. If it's so fulfilling, why has he not been doing it before this? Does he feel a yearning to produce music? Or is he just picturing how cool he will look with a guitar in his lap?

Writers sometimes find that we would rather "have written" than write. The idea of being a bestselling author, or appearing on Oprah, has a lot more appeal that sitting in front of the keyboard knowing that you could be at the beach, or spending time with your family. It all takes time. And if you haven't found the time before now, if you don't feel that deep desire to play or sing, I don't know that you have it.

It's very convenient to believe that if ONLY you could be a musician, you would be happy. You will still be the same person after you learn to play the guitar.

But you don't need our permission to start.

... but I'm going the other way. I'm a 51-year-old attorney studying to be an opera diva.

Wasn't it Dave Barry that said, somewhere in middle age, all the old hippies switch from the freedom and poverty of surfing to become bankers, and the bankers say to heck with those long days and drudgery, I'm gonna get me a surfboard and live a little!

It's all a matter of balance. When you find your more lucrative day job, you will appreciate the downside of having to get up every morning and do something less inspiring than making jazz.

Only you can decide if the trade-off is worth it, or more to the point, unavoidable.

There is no question that you can do it.

Death to the Second!

I love my child more than you love your gun.

Pry it from your cold, dead fingers? Okay!

I'm still mad at CW for the whoring sea donkey (good name, btw) show-- I was totally in my Veronica groove until the two month hiatus, and now I'm two weeks behind. I also feel that the 2nd story arc-- though the death was an interesting premise-- totally let me down. I feel the LoVe, but they kept the on-again, off-again going on too long. I still don't think the third season's a total bust... I'm not loving the idea of fast forwarding the series either, for all its need to awkwardly re-introduce key characters, but I dearly hope it gets picked up for a 4th season regardless.

Grey's Anatomy was fun and tolerable for a year. Now I can barely stand watching a second of it.

And "Private Practice" is a terrible title.

I plan on watching the BBC next year. And Bones. Why don't you ever talk about Bones?

I have used up all my tears for VM. Sadness abounds.

I liked Drive a lot-- it was like a well-definied Lost with more interesting characters. And Nathan Fillion. Nothing can be bad with Nathan Fillion. FOX kills me. In a bad way.