Since I have been on break for the past month, I took the liberty of reading a TON of books. Probably around 15 (I think I lost count after 12 but it’s definitely more than that). That’s about 4 books a week :-).
Some of the highlights include:
* Harnessing the Wind by William Kamkwamba, which I wrote about previously
* Every Patient Tells a Story by Lisa Sanders – this is a book that one of my teachers asked us to get for the class and then decided we weren’t going to read after all. It’s about medicine, not counseling, but interesting nonetheless.
* The Other Side of Paradise by Staceyann Chin – this one is by far my favorite! It’s about a girl growing up in Jamaica without knowing her parents and being passed from one (often abusive) home to the next.
* Auschwitz and After by Charlotte Delbo – translated from the French, this is an account of the holocaust captured in poetry and short vignettes. Beautiful writing; very graphic but moving.
* Keeping You a Secret by Julie Anne Peters – This one was recommended by my Ethics professor; it is a fiction story about a high school girl and her experience coming out as a lesbian and the discrimination she faces. Also a really good read, though the writing is sort of juvenile.
I have also been sick for over a week now and haven’t felt like doing much of anything except laying on the couch like a turd, so I have spent a lot of time watching NOVA. (I have always loved science, even since I was a kid). I saw some interesting episodes, including one about a robot car race that had a team from Carnegie Mellon where my brother goes to school. Also there were episodes about deciphering the ancient Mayan code, doing an archeological search of a remote cave in the Holy Land, rebuilding the Parthenon, the discovery of a four-winged dinosaur (which led to the conclusion that birds are descended from dinosaurs—wow!), and a piece about the making of refrigeration and absolute zero.
Wow, I am such a nerd.