The Washington Post recently reported on Japan's declining marriage rate. Short story: Men are looking to wives to take over maternal roles, and that scenario isn't very appealing to most single Japanese women:

"There is the rarely stated but almost universal expectation of Japanese men to be fed, clothed and picked up after. 'I am willing to take care of and give comfort to a man whom I care about, but that does not mean I want to be his mother,' she said."

In fact, WaPost found that women who had married were less likely than their male counterparts to remarry after divorce. The article states that post-divorce, men are unhappy and remarry quickly, while "the women are relatively happy and often delay remarriage." Perhaps it's the "burn me once" theory?

In addition to the lack of women looking to take on the mommy role, a stalled economy and a posh home life are keeping adult children in their parents' homes. A Calgary Herald piece from early August reported that Japanese parents — fed up with housing, feeding, and taking care of their single adult children — were taking matters into their own hands and organizing events exclusively for parents to find mates for their children.

"A government report from 2005 showed 71.5 percent of men aged 25 to 29 were unmarried, compared with 47.1 percent in 1990. For women, 32 percent from 30 to 34 years of age were single, compared with half that number in 1990."

With her bare hands! Pardon the exclamation points, but this is something out of a Stephen King short story. According to the LA Times, what was thought to be standard B&E is now turning out to be much more.

Fifty-one-year-old Susan Kuhnhausen returned home in September of last year to an intruder, hammer in hand, ready to bludgeon his victim. He did, in fact, get one blow in, but before he could do further damage, she wrestled the hammer out of his grip, then proceeded to strangle him to death.

Police have been investigating since the September attack, and recently uncovered a link between Kuhnhausen's ex-husband and the deceased attacker.

Investigators believe that Michael Kuhnhausen, distraught over the divorce, hired the attacker to kill his wife. Bits and pieces of a paper trail are slowly revealing that the attack was premeditated and Kuhnhausen to be the mastermind.

Michael Kuhnhausen was taken into custody and charged with conspiracy to commit murder and attempted murder and held on $500,000 bail.

Fortunately, Susan Kuhnhausen is in the clear: Police say she acted in self-defense. She acted very well, indeed.

Football great Michael Strahan has been granted a Giant relief. A New Jersey state appeals court has ruled that he didn't have to pay $18,000 a month in child support of his 3-year-old twin daughters as part of his divorce settlement with his ex-wife, Jean.

But Jean isn't going to be shopping at the Dollar Store any time soon. In their bitter divorce, where nasty accusations flew like fumbling footballs, she caught a $15.3 million settlement, slightly more than what was specified in their prenuptial agreement. Strahan paid around half of that, and they recently settled a dispute over the remaining $6.5 million.

The court sent the child support case back to a lower court in Essex County and ordered it to recalculate the amount. Judge Lorraine Parker, one of the three judges involved in the decision, wrote, “Both parents have a shared obligation to support their children.”

In the decision, Judge Parker said that “as a healthy, educated, 41-year-old, [Jean Strahan] is capable of earning her own income.”

Perhaps Jean Strahan overstepped when she made certain claims for her daughters’ expenses, including $30,000 a year for landscaping, designer handbags, and $22,000 for baby pictures.

The three-judge panel also ruled that Strahan doesn’t need to pay for his wife’s lawyers, nor does he need to get a multi-million dollar disability policy.

Strahan announced yesterday that he has not accepted a request from the Giants to return to the team. Vacationing in Greece, he said he preferred to stay retired. It would have been his 16th season of professional football.

His salary would have been $8 million a year.

Instead he will receive a $2 million salary working for Fox Sports pregame Sunday show covering the National Football League.

Most often, the government stepping in to the average citizen's life is not so much of a good thing. But what do you expect in Shanghai? But sometimes, stepping in isn't such a bad thing, after all. The Chinese city now offers divorce counseling free of charge to couples filing with Shanghai's Songjiang District, reports web site china.org.cn.

Since last June, all couples have had access to psychological consultants from the district's Psychological Consultant Association. Consequently, 30% have accepted the offer, and 70% of those couples have reconciled. Overall, more than 300 divorce petitions have been dropped.

And for the remaining husbands and wives who would like to proceed? The counselors help to negotiate custody and division of property. Did we mention this is free of charge?

China isn't the only country stepping up to the divorce-mediation plate. Australia's Family Relationship Centre offers "providing free information for families, the centre has qualified, professional staff to help families with the difficulties associated with separation or divorce," says the Manning River Times.

A spokesperson for the organization says she hopes families see the center as an alternative to court entirely.

Doesn't seem like such a bad idea, does it?

I have a secret. My name is Naomi, I am a journalist, and I don’t watch the news. I used to try and hide this fact, sort of skimming the headlines so I could fake my way through conversations involving current events. But I got a news alert today that tells me exactly why I am completely in the right. I am vindicated and I never have to watch the news again.

Jose Luis de Jesus Miranda is a preacher. I’m not totally sure where “preacher” ends and “cult leader” begins, but that’s neither here nor there. In the beginning of his illustrious career, Miranda got famous because he convinced everybody that he was the second coming of Jesus.

Then he changed his mind and proclaimed he was no longer Jesus. He was the Antichrist.

His wife filed for divorce, although I can’t imagine why.

Since nobody knows exactly how much money the second coming of Christ has stuffed under the holy mattress, Miranda was ordered to pay interim alimony to the tune of $15,000 a month and he’s five months behind. He figured that instead of paying, he’d just disappear and go out on the lam. But what would you expect from the Antichrist? Post-dated checks delivered by courier?

The good news is that the preacher — and you know he’s a preacher because he has “666” tattooed on himself, as do his constituents — never physically abused his wife. She is, however, seeking compensatory damages from the emotional turmoil caused by his repeated threats that he’d send the “angels of destruction” on her and the kiddies.

And they ask me why I don’t watch the news.

Canadian web site globeandmail.com reported recently on what may be a national record. Nope, not the Olympics. The length and cost of a Vancouver couple's divorce proceedings.

Bernard Lotzkar and his former wife, Marian, appealed the $1 million legal bill that followed their 29-day court hearing. The former couple squabbled over everything from inheritances (justified) to gold coins (really?) to airline mileage points (oh, c'mon!).

The former Ms. Lotzkar's attorney "...billed her for 904 hours; his associate ... for 1,464 hours. Bills were also sent out for two lawyers who spent a total of 210 hours on research."

Just to put this in perspective, Britney's legal fees amounted to less than $750,000.

But who to top the Canadians than the Americans? Last year, a Connecticut couple spent 86 days in court and racked up a $13 million, according to The Hartford Advocate.

Let's hope we don't have more stories to file under "ridiculously expensive court cases" anytime soon.

If your new man was going to be working with the home wrecker who took away your husband, what would do? That dilemma may now be facing the lovely Reese Witherspoon, who, post-divorce from Ryan Phillippe, is seeing Jake Gyllenhaal.

In Touch Weekly says that Abbie Cornish — the actress whose affair with Ryan Philippe caused the end of his marriage to Reese — may be cast as Jake Gyllenhaal's love interest in an upcoming film.

Of course the natural instinct would be to say to Jake, "No way do I want you to act in that movie with her." But getting roles in Hollywood is not as easy as finding the latest Fendi bag, and directors make casting choices, unless the actor is a major A-lister. Witherspoon is in that league; Gyllenhaal is not.

And in that line of work, many relationships are created by on-set romances. Angelina Jolie met two husbands and her current amour — Johnny Lee Miller, Billy Bob Thornton, and now Brad Pitt — while working on films.

Robert Rodriguez left his wife after meeting Rose McGowan; Russell Crowe had an affair with Meg Ryan, causing her to break-up with Dennis Quaid; and Reese met Gyllenhaal while doing the movie Rendition.

That, of course, is one of the perils of that business. Few other places have you kissing strangers passionately as part of the job requirement, or going off to an exotic location for months, away from family and spouse.

But many people meet their future spouses at work. In an Elle/MSNBC poll, two-thirds of the 31,000 people polled reportedly flirt at the office.

But take heart, that your heart may not be permanently broken. Flirting is flirting.

Only 55 percent of office relationships turn into marriage, according to the Society of Human Resources Management.

Republican First Lady wannabe Cindy McCain has always said she's an only child — which came as a painful shock to her two half sisters. McCain's parents both had a child from previous relationships, but as was often the case a generation ago, these children were really treated as second class citizens.

Kathleen Hensley Portalski, 65, is the product of Arizona beer baron Jim Hensley and his first wife, Mary Jeanne Parks. Hensley and his second wife, Marguerite "Smitty" Johnson, had Cindy 11 years later. Cindy's other half-sister, Dixie L. Burd, was born to Johnson before her marriage to Hensley.

Kathleen Portalski told National Public Radio that being ignored by McCain has made her angry and hurt. "It makes me feel like a nonperson," she said.

How sad that anyone has to feel that.

Unlike today, where divorce settlements allow ample time for fathers to see their children — and many dads now are asking and getting joint custody — agreements years ago gave fathers little time with their children. Also, there wasn't as much effort by fathers to see these children and integrate them into their new family because there was a stigma around the word divorce (the divorce rate remained below 1% throughout the 1940’s) The idea of a "perfect" intact family and living up to that image was the driving force in society.

Portalski has told reporters that her father Jim would see her a few times a year, usually around Christmas and birthdays, and called “occasionally.” He also helped with school clothes and tuition. Later, he would also send some modest sums to Portalski’s kids.

Since there was no Firstwivesworld.com then — nor stricter laws enforcing child support payments based on income — many children like Kathleen were not integrated into their father’s new family.

Britney Spears is finding, like the rest of us, that divorce can be expensive. Not only emotionally, but financially.

To resolve her custody dispute with ex-husband Kevin Federline, the belly-baring singer had to pay her attorney $466,000 and his lawyers $250,000. Those bills are enough to give anyone a major bellyache.

Federline was granted full custody of their two sons but she does get overnight visits.

Spears and Federline married in 2004 and divorced last July. She is one of a growing number of women who pay "manimony" — Federline gets $20,000 a month from Spears.

But considering her immature antics, irresponsible behavior, and two hospitalizations, most saw Federline as a better alternative to parent.

However, news reports say that Spears is now expected to contest part of the legal bill as being too high.

According to Us Magazine, the largest bill comes from attorney Stacy D. Phillips, who says in court filings that she is owed nearly $407,000 for four months of work. Phillips claims she has written off another $125,000 in fees.

Phillips states in court documents the case was made more complicated because Spears is under the temporary conservatorship of her father, James. He took control of his daughter's personal and financial affairs after a series of high-profile incidents of erratic behavior and two hospitalizations.

Any payments will have to be approved by a Los Angeles court commissioner, and attorneys representing Spears' and her father's interests indicated last week in court they intend to contest Phillips' bill.

Diana Mercer, a California attorney who specializes in mediation, says she is sympathetic to Britney Spears’s lawyer.

Good news for would-be adulterers in South Korea!

The country’s Supreme Court ruled this week that people who are in the process of a mutually agreed upon divorce won’t get arrested for having sex outside of marriage.

Previously, those who had sex with someone other than their spouse before their divorce was finalized were considered to have committed adultery. Adultery is kind of a big deal in Korea. Like, criminal act with two years of jail time big deal.

The ruling came after a 57-year-old man in the process of divorcing his wife was arrested for having sex with, wait for it, a barmaid. (It’s always the barmaid.) After 25 years of marriage, the man who is only identified in the media as Chung, decided to pack his bags. After a bit of stewing, his wife agreed to the divorce, and they set up separate households while they figured out their finances and he got on with screwing the barmaid.

Mrs. Chung got wind of the liaison and decided to call the fuzz. Apparently, Chung got off. Get it?

With over 11,000 couples filing for divorce each year and citing infidelity as their platform, there are a lot of potential criminals hanging out in the bars of Korea. Last year alone, more than 1,200 people were indicted for sleeping around.

What I want to know is, what’s the charge for sleeping with the spouse you decided you were divorcing? Because in this writer’s opinion, sleeping with the ex leads to more problems than going home with the barmaid.

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