I ate at Chez Pannise in the 70s...it was where I had my first cassoulet, a dish so wonderful that when we finally went to France, I searched everywhere for it, finding only pale imitations. I am a devoted fan of that restaurant in its early years, despite the fact that she did not actually invent anything (up and coming chefs like Jeremiah Tower and Wolfgang Puck did).

Over time Ms. Waters became a food celebrity, particularly in the Bay Area. This came naturally because of her ability, through the fabled restaurant, to support many small local farmers. This seems to have been her epiphany, a conviction that because she, and her (mostly wealthy) clientèle could do it, so could schools, communities, regions, nations, and the world.

Critics more knowledgeable about the grim realities of that prognosis have given her enough grief. I think that as a radical voice-in-the-wilderness she deserves credit for the move among educated families toward local and organic food.

But Ms. Waters has long since abandoned any pretense of building a "California cuisine", and plays no hands-on role in Chez Pannise. The last time we ate there, we were charged a fortune for a meal of lamb shanks and lentils, a homely preparation I can easily surpass at home. Having access to quality ingredients does not make a restaurant great, and places like Bay Wolf, Olivetos, and Cafe Rouge have supplanted it as sources of inventive and original cooking in the East Bay.

Waters is so deeply engaged with her own legend that she has no awareness of how mediocre her flagship restaurant has become.

If this celebrity chef/restaurateur can't even maintain quality control over one overpriced trendy restaurant, I have grave doubts about her theory that he change the world.

Oh. My. God. Somebody you are involved with wants to experiment with drugs!

Let's spare the sensationalism this seems to have engendered, not only in Cary, but his loyal posse -- in fact, every single letter that got a "star".

Ignore Cary. He's an uptight moralistic jerk more often than not. Instead, consider the actual reality, not the sensationalized tabloid version of addiction following the first hit of cocaine.

Dude, many people, including those far more accomplished and experienced and successful than you, have tried drugs. Yeah, coke, all the psychoactives, even the "Big H". I am 70 years old, and I tried virtually everything before finding out that my personal downfall was prescription speed.

And that is a part of maturing. You learn. No "father" will ever convince you not to have experiences that intrigue you; only your own life will give you the perspective. This is the tragedy of Prohibition, both that of alcohol in the 1920s, and that of marijuana today.

Most important, you will not learn from paternalistic assholes telling you that THEY tried it, and DON'T DO IT.

So right off, we've got a basic problem of vast age difference, sexism (yep, the younger girlfriend, who has to be "protected" against herself), and control.

Does this sound familiar?

I'd say the writer needs some serious personal therapy to find out who HE is (and why he is so threatened by someone else's behavior), before deciding to create rules for his GF.

Having not read this work, I cannot comment on it.

But I CAN comment on the life and work of author. Tolkien was not a New Age prophet. He was a brilliant linguist and equally brilliant scholar of Northern Indo-European languages and legends.

Let us award him his due in that field, before we address his latter-life cynicism and good/evil dichotomy.

To my mind, the best book of the Ring series isn't even one of the three: it's The Hobbit. There, we find a cheerfully innocent Bilbo, who willy-nilly finds an unwelcome "Adventure" thrust upon him. And who gradually rises to the task, with much humor to leaven the violence.

Only in The Hobbit will you find villains who are amusing, inept dolts (the trolls), much less villains who are sympathetic, and complex. (That is, who share the qualities of real people rather than archetypes.) Surely Smaug is the wittiest, most self-aware, and most charming dragon in all mythology.

Alas, Tolkien was a convert to Roman Catholicism (to which faith he converted C.S. Lewis), and everything he wrote thereafter must be re-examined in that light. His faith became his touchstone, and black/white good/evil, rather than shades of grey, became the source of his famous trilogy.

That is, everything AFTER The Hobbit, must be considered as evangelistic.

Any examination of these very late papers must be examined in light of his deeply felt religious beliefs.

They are not discredited, but they lack the humanity of his early work.