It has been quite a week in addiction. It was an “Oprah” show twofer starring Whitney Houston and later Mackenzie Phillips. The biggest news about the Houston interview seems to be about her troubled marriage and the lukewarm vocal performance she gave—that and how Oprah Winfrey deemed it her greatest interview ever. But listening to Houston talk about her addiction to “rock cocaine” (that’s just her pretty way of saying “crack,” boy and girls), I could not help but worry for her ultimate sobriety a tad more than I worried about the quality of her voice. The following exchange was both the most terrifying and hilarious part of the entire two-hour extravaganza:

HOUSTON: We weren’t doing the glass, we weren’t doing, like, pipe-smoking. We didn’t get that far, no. Noooo.

WINFREY: So how are you smoking it, then?

[Winfrey’s expression is really priceless here. She has no idea how one uses crack, is visibly uncomfortable, and even has a few disconcerting moments of manic laughter.]

HOUSTON: You put it in your marijuana, Oprah. OK, go with me here. You put your marijuana, you lace it, you roll it up, and you smoke it in your weed.

[At this point, Houston is literally miming making a joint laced with crack cocaine.]

HOUSTON: It’s just another form. It’s almost like heroin-cocaine speed-balling, but you level it off with the marijuana, OK?

Um, OK. I mean, as long as you weren’t, like, pipe-smoking, I suppose it’s all very innocent. It’s just such an addict thing to make these crazy distinctions between pipe-smoking and speed-balling, isn’t it?

But, if that weren’t enough of a clue into the fragility of her state of mind vis à vis addiction, Houston makes sure also to draw a bright clear line between her drug use and her drinking. She still has a glass of wine at the bar every now and then, see. I’m not saying that every drug addict is an alcoholic, but here’s something to chew on: Alcohol compromises smart decision-making processes. And, when you’re only several months drug-free, you might want all your faculties operating in tip-top condition to fight the incredible temptations that years of drug abuse have left your brain disconcertingly susceptible to. Just a thought.

Next up, the “Oprah” show snagged former TV star Mackenzie Phillips for a tell-all about Phillips’ ten-year sexual relationship with her own father, John Phillips, as detailed in her new book, High On Arrival. It all started with a 19-year-old Mackenzie waking up from a drug-and-alcohol-induced blackout to find herself engaged in intercourse with her own father—a rape that, according to Mackenzie, became a regular (and “consensual”) occurrence. (Note to Phillips: Incest is never consensual.) If true, it’s hardly surprising that Mackenzie Phillips has spent the majority of her adult life battling addictions of one kind or another. Between the disturbing scars of a young adulthood powerless to a nightmarish relationship and the seemingly endless access to drugs her wealth gave her, it would be surprising if Phillips didn’t have issues with addiction.

And yet. There is something about a woman who can’t be more than 13 months sober—Phillips’ last arrest for heroin and cocaine possession was at LAX in late August of 2008—appearing on one of the most widely watched television programs on the planet to talk about her horrific incestuous abuse, all in service of her new memoir, that just doesn’t sit well with me. Phillips described her worldview in her twenties as a dystopian amalgam of drugs and sex with her father, a world where “how things should be” and “the rules of society” became “warped and twisted.” Unfortunately, however far Phillips has come in this last year of getting sober and writing a book, her worldview strikes me as still a bit off, as still a bit warped and twisted. Maybe if she weren’t talking about a dead man, hawking a book, or had more time in sobriety, I could listen with more compassionate ears. But something about Phillips and her supposed recovery just feels wrong.