It's also worth mentioning that marinating meat before it's grilled, or even just coating it with some sort of liquid (soy sauce being an excellent choice) apparently cuts down enormously on carcinogens.

Thanks for these links. I've been using lump charwood for my weekly barbecues (even in winter; I've barbecued during blizzards in New England) every week for many years now, and I can't believe that I'd never found these sites!

Paul N Henry is right on the money. LW almost certainly going to find herself out on the street, soon. Meanwhile Olga will probably get a promotion.

How do I know? I was in a very similar situation, except that in my case it was a subordinate who, among other things, brought in a knife and threatened to kill me. When I complained to HR, I was told that it was my problem, and that they'd like to fire both of us - we were, in their precise words, "as replaceable as used tissues, and worth about as much".

I'm not dumb. I quit within the week. My subordinate got my job. And I'm pleased to say that that firm recently went out of business. Now I work at a place where I actually get some respect (plus the work is much more enjoyable and pays better).

Sorry to go on like that, but the thing is, it's really obvious: management is NOT going to do anything about Olga, period. Maybe she gives really great blowjobs. Maybe she has photos of top management killing puppies, or Enron-izing the pension fund. Or maybe she just has a sparkling personality. In any case, it couldn't be clearer that she is in for life, and that LW can only be destroyed if she keeps this up.

To be honest, I'd says the odds are good that it's too late for LW to do anything to save herself; she's likely to find reprimands being entered on her work record, and her next annual review will probably be her worst ever. She's on her way out the door.

She has my sympathy. And a suggestion: shut up about Olga at work, take up whatever stress management techniques work for you, and get your resume up-to-date NOW. For your kids' sake, if not your own.

I agree that the LW should dump her "husband" ASAP; tomorrow wouldn't be soon enough. And 40 is NOT too old to have a child, unless you've already gone through menopause.

As for whether or not the letter is a fake, my BS detector did not go off, and I've been running my own advice column for a while now on a site that probably gets a thousand times more trolls than Cary. So I do have a little experience in the field.

Her HUSBAND was possibly (probably) lying, but there was nothing in her own letter that rang terribly false to me.

Still, for those with better BS-detectors than me, perhaps you should go over to http://advicenators.com/ and start your own columns. Show Cary how to do it right. Which I suspect is something that most people here secretly want to do anyway. :D

Am I the only one whose first thought after seeing Colbert's bit was that he'd better be careful in dark alleys? Bushclan is an incredibly vengeful bunch.

The thing that amazed me the most about the original DBJ article was the number of highly-placed idiots who felt that Jackson's actions were not only defensible, but legitimate.

"Jackson is right; what possessed the contractor to criticize the president in a business setting? But what possessed Jackson to say he's not going to complete the business transaction?" Jillson said.

"Jillson" being Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University, which apparently doesn't include the First Amendment in its curricula. Perhaps it was removed to make room for Blame the Victim 101.

Rod Bailey with The Staubach Co., who put the REEC event together, said Jackson was simply telling it like it is.

"It's politics at its finest," he said. "If you talk to other government officials, they would have similar stories. The same thing holds true in business. If you don't like Roger Staubach, you're not going to work at The Staubach Co."

The difference being that the Staubach Co. is presumably owned by Roger Staubach, serves its stockholders or owner(s) rather than the general public, and doesn't have a charter specifically enshining freedom of speech for its members.

Which, of course, the USA does.

Unless this country turned into the United States of Bush (a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Bush family) when I wasn't looking, of course. In which case I am totally in the wrong, and may expect to be righteously and legally "disappeared" for lèse majesté at any moment.

I was working with my new iBook in a dim room about a year ago. I really couldn't have anticipated what would happen; it was hardly my fault. Perhaps the warmth of the iBook on my thighs lulled me too much; perhaps it was the dim light, and the gentle whirring of the iBook's fan.

In any case, I woke from an odd dream about a tiger to find myself, the iBook, and the room in flames. The melting plastic of the case had charred itself to the skin of my thighs. In agony I attempted to pull the searing iBook off of my lap, but my fingers were charred to uselessness. As the flames and acrid smoke rose from the keys, my eyes blurred and I felt consciousness fade.

And what happened then, you ask?

I died. It is a ghost who is writing this.

(Sorry, no offense meant to anyone - least of all Lord Dunsany. I just couldn't resist. :D)