I think the letter you are recalling is really just an episode of the Simpsons.

Homer bought Marge a bowling ball for her birthday that had his name on it. She was so mad that she decided to go bowling herself. While there a smooth bowler guy hit on her and she started to swoon for him, but as always in the last moment Marge realized she really loves Homer and dropped the bowling guy.

I can only suggest you try being a lot less boring.

My favorite one is the one that introduced me to this column and made me look forward to my daily "Since You Asked" fix. It's titled "American Beauty" and gives Cary's take on how to keep ones marriage interesting. I still send it to friends (no, not as a wedding gift!) as I think his ideas would work in any relationship.

Your columns about parenting and relationships with parents are among the most interesting, because we may not all have kids but we all have or had parents and most of us have confronted the issue of whether or not to have kids. The 2 most poignant letters and/or responses in my view:

1. "My dad is filled with regret for things in the past". I particularly liked this letter because the LW wasn't writing to complain about her father (as so many writers to you often are), although he was not perfect. She was genuninely concerned about how to make his situation better. It was very touching.

2. "Should I have a kid or not?" -- Loved the letter, and the response from June Brockwell was just beautiful. Your response, on the other hand, indicated you were more concerned about hawking Salon's new book. So we've come full circle.

He's calling himself "ben", but it's definitely Stewie from "Family Guy."

Just a note to say thank you to the many, many people who have sent their suggestions here and via e-mail to advice@salon.com. It's extremely gratifying -- especially all the ideas from "Ben" (Gee, thanks a lot, Dad! At least you could sign your own name!)

Anyway, I'll be going through all of this over the next week or two.

best -- ct

Columns I really enjoyed:

I'm a Buddhist in Big Pharma

Can I kill a cat if it poops in my yard?

At what point can I give up on my son?

All of them have a good combination of interesting question and great Cary response. Good luck with your book!

Um, where, to coin a phrase, is the outrage?

I'm with Uncle or Father Ben, more or less, but I'll say it just once.

Please: Do not sacrifice trees, even recycled ones, nor a single millivolt of precious energy, on producing such a needless addition to the world's surplus of refuse.

No matter the current euphemism, Cary, there's a reason it's called vanity publishing.

This was one of my recent favorites. The response reminded me so vividly of what I was feeling in high school/early twenties.

Also, I will be honest, here. Although I read the column every day, I would not be inclined to purchase the book, even if I hadn't read the columns already. There would need to be much more to the book than just the advice columns and answers (and I don't mean something like including the reader responses, which I do not think is a good idea). What is the purpose of the book? Is one meant to open it to seek inspiration while sitting on the subway? Or before going to bed? The book needs a larger point or theme...on par with a good novel. I think the letters should be a starting point, not the meat of the book.

But that's just me, and I recognize that there is a large market for advice books. And that writing this book might be more about Cary needing to do it than anything else.

Wow MTeresa - I sent that to a lot of my grad school friends who were still single then - and it's still taped on some cubicles!!

PS: Here's a list of the ones that's been sent around:

http://dir.salon.com/story/sex/col/tenn/2003/04/18/sya_fri/index.html

http://dir.salon.com/story/mwt/col/tenn/2005/04/05/i_love_you/index.html

http://dir.salon.com/story/mwt/col/tenn/2005/02/23/untouchable/index.html

1. A fair selection of those "what happened to my life?" letters, the lady with the crush on her teenage son's friend comes to mind as being one of the most eye-popping.

2. One or more of the "I want/don't want kids but my spouse no longer agrees with me" letters.

3. Some of the "do I tell so and so the truth" -- about their spouse having an affair, or my personal favorite, the daughter given up for adoption that she is a child of rape. (But your answer could use some work -- in fact, you ought to consider how you might have changed your answer in light of comments)

And my two personal favorites --

The lady whose husband reverted to childhood and illusions of rock star success after his parents gave them a down payment for a house.

And the woman who asked you about whether she could truly be her real self if she had to take Zoloft. Your answer was simply great.

How about the one where the aging adult manchild gives horribly dated advice along the lines of "Follow your bliss" to people who, remarkably, seem even more self indulgent and over privelaged than he is?

... what some other readers have said, but to give the book "added value" over what Internet readers have already seen, it seems to me that if original questioners could be persuaaded to give their responses to how the advice helped, what they thought of the readers letters, and how things worked out in the end, that would all be interesting, and would make ME a potential purchaser of the book.