More stuff I done looked at

I don't have enough to say about any of these three to merit standalone posts, but I'll pass these few thoughts along anyway:

Friends with Benefits - starring Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake as, well, friends with benefits.  I got this one for Mr. Mouse because he thinks Mila Kunis is super-cute (for the record, she is).  For a standard plot-line rom-com, this one was pretty entertaining.  Timberlake can apparently actually act; he and Kunis had good chemistry; it was surprisingly sexy (for not really showing anything); and I liked it when Mila's character took Justin's character on a tour of the "real" New York.  Subtract some points from JT's character apparently never having seen a flashmob before his first trip to NYC despite growing up in L.A.

Pig Perfect by Peter Kaminsky - a non-fiction book about Kaminsky's quest for the perfect country ham, from France to Georgia to the unimprovable Iberian hams of Spain.  Loaded with history, leavened with some science, sprinkled with some delicious sounding recipes and written in an accessible, conversational style.

The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta - this raved-about book by the author of Election explores what happens to the people left behind after the Rapture.  Well, they don't know for sure if it was the Rapture - and wisely, Perrotta never tries to explain exactly what happened - but one day, all across the globe, millions of people just vanished into thin air, right in front of their families, friends and loved ones.  The Leftovers follows some of the denizens of a small town as they try to pick up the pieces: some just trying to get their lives back to normal, some just trying to live, some joining creepy cults.  The characterizations of these wounded remnants are finely drawn and Perrotta has a good handle on small town life.  The story just doesn't go anywhere or do much of anything - it's just an examination of these peoples' lives for a brief period of time - and I prefer my novels to be overloaded with plot.