In 2010, an anonymous writer took over the advice column "Dear Sugar" at the literary website The Rumpus. Last night, Valentine's Day, she went public with her identity at a “coming-out” party in San Francisco. Like many others, I’ve become obsessed with her advice, but I wasn’t sure I wanted her to come out, and told her so when I interviewed her last year. Still, she did it anyway, which shows how valuable my advice is, I guess.

Sugar, Cheryl Strayed, published a grief-focused novel called Torch in 2006, and there’s a 4,500-word excerpt of her upcoming memoir Wild in Vogue. (In an amazing bit of timing, [...]

In the car, my friend Jonathan and I talked about my kids, and his job, and how we feel old all the time. He’d come up that morning from North Carolina, where we once lived together, to come to the concert with me; now we were driving together from Arlington to Baltimore in a CRV whose backseat was dense with child-safety seats and princess books.

Jonathan recalled how he’d once received a mixtape from a girl he thought might be interested in him, only to discover that it featured “Song Against Sex,” which he took as a poor omen. Our friend Ehren gave me a song by the band on [...]

"Woman-beating rage-broccoli Chris Brown lip-synced his single 'Turn Up The Music' (without being threatened by Sir Elton John) and danced roughly as well as a third-rate Chicago footwork dancer. He ended his performance by back-flipping off the stage, though sadly not off the earth." —Good riddance to bad garbage. We will largely sign on to this take on last night's Grammys, although casting Jennifer Hudson's rendition of "I Will Always Love You" as "technically adequate," Sasha Frere-Jones, is a full-on LIE and not at all okay. Also congratulations go to Grammy winner Betty White—beating out Tina Fey… and Val Kilmer. Who knew.