Hunter S. Thompson is my Hero. And Book Catalogues.

Okay, so it's not that simple. I'm on a huge HST kick right now, even though I've only read one of his books.

That's gonna change. I have a few in my Amazon Wish List, and they're the next books I'm going to buy.

Hunter S. Thompson represents a strange dynamic in the American spectrum of politics. He's an enigma, a paradox, because he is (or was) simultaneously truthful about what is going on in America, the absolute power corrupting absolutely part of it, and he was also a borderline drug addict, if not an addict outright.

He believed in the power of experimenting with his third eye, using mind and mood altering drugs to get him where he wanted to go. But he also understood the limits - sometimes - and I put him in a similar place - in my mind at least - as Bill Hicks, who was also kind of a visionary, an idealist, who used drugs and alcohol to sort of cut away all that smugness we hold about ourselves in this world.

Because neither Hicks nor Hunter S. Thompson could stomach the idea that these people, the politicians, were anything but corrupt. They saw through it, and we laugh at their opinions sometimes because of what they believed, that they would actually call a spade a spade, you know?

Like, I enjoy politics a great deal, and yet I fall into the same rhythmns as everyone else, talking about politicians as if they truly acted on anything even remotely heartfelt. They might have passions, but look at what happened the last time a president had a passion for something: we get a disaster in Iraq, a blow-job in the oval office (and the subsequent lying about it), No New Taxes, Iran-Contra, Grenada, etc.

But moving on.

Also, tonight in BORDERS, I saw a book by Nick Hornby which I thought was interesting. It's more or less an adventure in reading. So I thought, "Why not co-opt that?"

Well, sort of. I'm going to try to keep a conscious list of all of the books I buy and read, and my particulare thoughts on them at the time. Maybe it'll rock, and perhaps it will suck. Either way, I'm doing it.

What I'm reading right now:

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby.

What's up next:

You Suck! by Christopher Moore

After that? DOn't know. Oh, and, by the way, this is totally not what Hunter S. Thompson sat around doing, cataloguing his damned book collection. But, then again, I guess I'm not Hunter S. Thompson. I'd rather write about living the crazy life than actually go out and do it. I may be wrong, but that seems to be the allure of Mr. Thompson.