A Short History Of Nearly Everything

I just got done listening to A Short History Of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson.  A bit long (19 hours) and a bit too heavy on geology and evolution, but I really enjoyed the cosmology and physics (especially quantum -- I wish he would have spent more time on this).  After listening to the book you realize just how volatile our world is.  From killer volcanoes to meteors that could potentially strike and obliterate life on this planet.  The fact that we exist here at this time is truly a miracle, but at the same time, the fact we exist here at this time is because this is the only time in the earth's existence where we could have existed.  Go back 100s of millions of years ago and we wouldn't even be able to breath the atmosphere that existed.  Go forward 100s of millions of years and we'll probably be in an ice age and no human beings will remain. You'll be surprise about 3/4th the way through to hear the F word.  I seemed totally out of place, but was actually quite hysterical in context.  I recommend it, if you have the time, otherwise I think just tuning into the Discovery or the History channels will suffice.  Now I'm listening to Sex Money Kiss by Gene Simmons.  I'm expecting not quite such a cerebral experience.

One note: my friggin' iPod refused to play past the 13h:15m:17s point.  I had to split the file.