Best Sources for Advice On-line

Are you the type of person who gets tripped up over wedding etiquette? Do you have a mother-in-law who is overbearing, a husband with a gambling problem, a wife with a low libido or a child who keeps demanding money from you, but never pays it back? Are you wondering how to meet the right person, or when to tell the person you are currently dating about your previous job as a stripper? Is your family fighting over a deceased parent's inheritance?

Advice columns cleverly and succinctly offer suggestions and advice for all these problems and many more. Advice columns often entertain as well as educate. I'll never forget the one advice column I read where the reader declared she had the worlds best boyfriend except for one thing: He was convinced he was a space alien from another planet.

Advice columns are a great way to put your own advice-giving skills to the test. Many readers enjoy thinking up their own bits of advice before reading what the "professionals" have to say to see how close they get to what gets printed.

Unique to the on-line advice columns is the ability to click and respond immediately to a letter or to ask for your own advice. No longer do you have to pen a letter, look for a stamp, track down the mailing address and trek your letter out to the mail box. Simply click and write and your e-mail could be in a column's upcoming installment.

If you are looking for advice, entertainment, a little honing of your advice-giving skills, or even help of your own, you won't want to miss these great advice columns on-line.

Dear Abby

Dear Abby is the long-running advice column started by Pauline Phillips in 1956. Now written by Pauline's daughter, Jeanne Phillips, the Dear Abby motto is, "uncommon common sense and youthful perspective." Over the years, "Dear Abby" has become synonymous with good, sound advice and according to Wikipedia, is the most read newspaper column worldwide.

"Dear Abby" can be found at several on-line sources including Yahoo news, but the official "Dear Abby" site is http://www.uexpress.com/dearabby/. A new "Dear Abby is published 7 days a week.

Dear Margo

Margo Howard writes the "Dear Margo" column which can be found on Yahoo news in their "Entertainment" section. Margo is the daughter of Eppie Lederer, creator and author of the Ann Landers advice column. "Dear Margo" offers sage advice with a little flare of sarcastic humor. Each answer is signed by Margo and a telling adverb: "Margo, Sympathetically" or "Margo Compromisingly," for example.

Margo's column comes out twice a week.

Dear Prudence

"Dear Prudence" was formerly the advice column written by Margo Howard, now author of "Dear Margo." It was recently taken over by Emily Yoffe and states that it's the place for "advice on manners and morals."

Yoffe has a quick wit and will take the writers of her letters to task if she feels they need a little wake-up call. "Dear Prudence" can be found at Slate.com and a new column of about 4-5 letters and answers comes out once a week. You can subscribe to "Dear Prudence" and have e-mail notifications and links sent to your in-box when new columns appear.

Annie's Mailbox

Creators Syndicate has a collection of "Lifestyle Columns" which contain no less than 10 advice columns. You can find the sassy Advice Goddess, Amy Alkon who offers sarcastic, no-mercy style advice to 20-somethings, Classic Ann Landers columns, and even "Ethnically Speaking," an advice column written by Larry Meeks which focuses on issues of race.

My favorite column, however, is "Annie's Mailbox" which is written by Marcy Sugar and Kathy Mitchell, the long time editors of the Ann Lander's column. Kathy and Marcy dispense kind and clear advice on manners, etiquette and personal relationships. Their tone, understandably, is very similar to the "Ann Landers" and "Dear Abby" columns.