This is an interesting story of what caused a porn star to take her own life. In many ways it’s like a less accomplished version of Shit Town. So I’m sorry to say that there will be minor spoilers for both podcasts in this review. If you haven’t listened to Shit Town (i.e. S Town) …
Category: 2019
The Soul of Basketball (2018, Ian Thomsen)
This book is basically meant for me as the Mavericks’ championship was the greatest thing to happen in my adult sports fan life prior to the Raptors winning recently. So I should love this. But I don’t quite. I’m going to try to articulate why.
Upheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis (2019) by Jared Diamond
This is a fascinating, flawed examination of national crises which is really a plea for human beings to better handle climate change (and other major global crises Diamond perceives).
Evil: The Science Behind Humanity’s Dark Side (2019) by Julia Shaw
So I listened to the audio book, which I think made a pretty big impression on me. I think I might have enjoyed the book more had I read it instead. This is a wide-ranging examination of the nature of “evil” from the perspective of psychology and, occasionally, philosophy. (Nietzsche gets a lot of references.) …
Your NBA Champion 2018-19 Toronto Raptors
I attended a Raptors game at Sky Dome. But I’m not one of those fans who can say that I have been a fan of the Raptors the entire time. The seats we had at the Dome were bad enough my only memory is not being able to see the ball well and not understanding …
Deadwood The Movie (2019, Daniel Minahan)
I love Deadwood. For much of the last fifteen years, I’d have insisted that Deadwood was the Second Greatest (dramatic, fictional) TV series of All Time. I regard it as sort of the Last Word in westerns. I have acted as an evangelist for the show, telling everyone I know about it and actually convincing …
Conviction (2019)
At this point it feels like there are far more true crime and criminal justice podcasts than I could ever listen to. Though it’s probably not true, it feels like there are more criminal justice and true crime podcasts than there are podcasts of any other genre. And many of them follow a similar formula, …
Riley Goes to Killington, Vermont – March 21-25, 2019
I have been to Vermont many times. I have skied at Jay Peak something like six times. I have skied at Bolton Valley and Stowe and, once before this year, Killington. But I hadn’t been to Vermont since I was in University, so long ago now it makes me feel old. So it was nice …
Fyre (2019, Chris Smith)
This is a fascinating film about the disastrous Fyre Festival that we all heard about on social media. It’s a classic story of the problem with “fake it until you make it” mentality of entrepreneurship. If you’ve watched or read anything about fraud, you’ve probably heard this story before. But it’s also about the problems …