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[book 2008] Some real variety
May. 31st, 2008 04:16 pm28. The Heroin Diaries: A year in the life of a shattered rock star by Nikki Sixx with Ian Gittins
I wasn't going to bother, honest, until I read this less than flattering review on AlterNet, and then I couldn't resist.
For the most part, it's just watching a trainwreck, as you might expect. A very few bits are actually funny (they all involve paranoia and Sixx flushing his entire drug supply down the toilet).
There was, however, one thing in which I sympathised with him. He wants to get clean, but his experience of rehab up to that point is that there was always lots of praying and trying to force him to accept God, so he refuses to go to any rehab that shoves God at him. I get that.
29. Rocks of Ages by Stephen Jay Gould
Let it not be said that there is no variety in my reading material.
I loved this less than other works of Gould's that I've read, because I don't especially care about the subject matter - this is the book where Gould claims that science and religion should be able to get along just fine. However, being Gould, it's still a lovely read full of interesting factoids.
For instance, I knew that Columbus and his contemporaries knew the world was round and the reason he couldn't get funding is that his estimate of the world's circumference was too small (as was the case). What I didn't know is that the myth that everyone else thought the world was flat is a deliberate invention of the 19th century, and it was worth it for that alone.
I wasn't going to bother, honest, until I read this less than flattering review on AlterNet, and then I couldn't resist.
For the most part, it's just watching a trainwreck, as you might expect. A very few bits are actually funny (they all involve paranoia and Sixx flushing his entire drug supply down the toilet).
There was, however, one thing in which I sympathised with him. He wants to get clean, but his experience of rehab up to that point is that there was always lots of praying and trying to force him to accept God, so he refuses to go to any rehab that shoves God at him. I get that.
29. Rocks of Ages by Stephen Jay Gould
Let it not be said that there is no variety in my reading material.
I loved this less than other works of Gould's that I've read, because I don't especially care about the subject matter - this is the book where Gould claims that science and religion should be able to get along just fine. However, being Gould, it's still a lovely read full of interesting factoids.
For instance, I knew that Columbus and his contemporaries knew the world was round and the reason he couldn't get funding is that his estimate of the world's circumference was too small (as was the case). What I didn't know is that the myth that everyone else thought the world was flat is a deliberate invention of the 19th century, and it was worth it for that alone.
