Modern Love, the Sunday column in the New York Times, has occasionally been enlivened by strippers, fatties and leukemia sex. But the fact remains that the weekly dissection of modern relationships is overwhelmingly conventional. As shown by our exhaustive analysis of themes since the series launched in 2004, Modern Love protagonists are preoccupied above all by their parents; and children, prospective or wailing. Same-generation passion: bleh. TABLE »