As a teenager I lived in South America and every so often a large apartment building would collapse and people would die. "Too much sand in the mix" people would say, accepting that contractors cheat and inspectors can be bought. This, along with a shocking lack of variety of shampoo and deodorant, came to symbolize the Third World for me. Buildings fall down and no one seemed too concerned and no one seemed to be looking into it.

Of all the Not Third World places, I agree with Mr. Keillor that Minnesota has to be right up there. But no. Apparently not. Or perhaps it remains to be seen if we have the national will to be concerned and the courage to look into it. Until then, I fear he is correct and we are on our own.

Over thirty years ago, when I was in 6th grade, a girl took a spiral notebook and wrote all our names in it, one classmate to a page. The book was circulated through the school for weeks, and everyone anonymously wrote their "true opinion" of each kid on his or her page.

I got the book on a Friday, and was allowed to take it home for the weekend. I spent hours reading it, obsessing over my page in particular. There were some "She's nice" and "She's sweet," and there were some slams, mercifully forgotten now. "Plain Jane" may have been in there. Other kids had terrible slams on their pages, especially the boy who had hit puberty early and was hairy and pimply all over, and the fat girl. I wrote on all the pages. Only a few slams, but they were in there.

By Sunday night I was a mess and could not sleep. I went downstairs and confessed the whole thing to my parents, who were reading by the fire. They asked me what I wanted to do, and I decided to rip up the book and burn it. The next day I told the Slambook creator that I lost it and gave her a new spiral notebook. She was annoyed, but she never troubled to make a new one.

I tell the story not to make myself out to be a saint; I was a gossip and a middle-tier popular girl with a mean streak. But given enough time even I could figure out that the Slambook was wrong. I regret the Internet, even as I appreciate it, because it removes the element of time from human interaction. We don't write letters and keep them overnight before we send them, and we can't rip up our Facebook comments after conscience strikes.

To the LW: perhaps you can follow some of the advice from Cary and others here, whatever of it that makes sense to you, and then perform a small ritual. Write down all you recall from the comments, and have a little bonfire.

Best wishes,

I first read Kurt Vonnegut and Ayn Rand as a teenager, and both stuck with me like hot glue. Now getting old, I sure hope I absorbed the ethos of the first more than the second. That's all.

Anna Nicole Smith was not caught in a private moment by hidden cameras - she was performing onstage in a semi-scripted role at a televised awards show.

This clip is part of her legacy, her work. That people are embarrassed by her performance is not Salon's fault. This is apparently how she wanted us to see her.

If this is not precisely who she wanted to be, if she was perhaps drunk or high and died even in part due to substance abuse, then the clip is a public service.

My boyfriend also quietly, deeply disapproved of my smoking. I would smoke the least number possible, just enough to make it without screaming, when were together. One weekend we went cross country skiing, and I lit up afterwards in front of a beautiful fire in his fireplace. All that exercise caused the inhaled smoke to make me crosseyed, I was dizzy and sickened, made a dramatic speech about my health and tossed the rest of the pack into the fire.

Of course, three hours later I was suffering and shaking and ready to run to the gas station for more. But pride stopped me, I remembered my speech, and I had heard that if a person can go 72 hours, he or she is clear of the physical addiction.

So I went 72 hours, and that was that, except for the part where I thought about them constantly for about ten years, and today still enjoy sitting next to smokers. My last cigarette was March 19th, 1984.

LW, I guess the moral of the story is to feel free to use those clean livers (like my then-boyfriend and yours) to jumpstart yourself. He did not quit, I did. He did not suffer, I did. But his disapproval helped me stop, and that is not a bad thing. A few years later I used the same quiet disapproval to help me stop drinking, and am still sober. We have been married over 20 years, and our kids are both unambiguously straightlaced. Smart, adventuresome, but they don't screw around with substances. They say they have Dad as a role model and my genes as an excuse to say no.

I am proud I allowed myself to be influenced by his love of health, for their sake and mine. And yes, he can be Mr. Rigid and prefers health foods. But I can be Miss Spontaneous with my Krispy Kremes, and he might shake his head at me as he eats his whole wheat toast, but there is no deep, quiet disapproval of that stuff (his facial expressions back then, after all, were just expressions of his fear).

Plus, we both have a sense of humor, and that helps.