What I'm Reading
Finished Noodling for Flatheads: Moonshine, Monster Catfish and Other Southern Comforts. Short book going through various subcultures in the southern US. Found it fairly interesting. Might be already familiar to US readers, but I'm only vaguely aware of what a coonhound is, for instance, and found it good to have the details filled in.

What I'm Reading 2
Finished The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Century 1910 takes the retro comic book series into the twentieth century. Cast has largely changed: Raffles the Amateur Cracksman, Carnacki the Ghost Finder, Orlando and Allan Quatermain Junior join Mina Harker.

Didn't find this one as compelling. This team seems bland compared to the psychotic Mr Hyde and the Invisible Man; and the plot isn't very impressive. The upcoming real horror seems to make it all seem a bit irrelevant.

However, there are two more volumes to come in the "Century" series: might improve.

What I'm Reading 3
Read the Which guide: Buy, Sell and Move House by Kate Faulkner. Slim book, has some good tips, though a bit of a maze of pull-quotes, boxes, tables and checklists. Still not sure how stamp duty works though.

What I'm Watching
Watched 1959 Western No Name on the Bullet. Great concept: a known assassin arrives in an apparently peaceful town, triggering a chain of events as the townsfolk try to work out who his target is. Lots of philosophical dialogue.

Unfortunately, the execution isn't as good as the concept. The plot is heavily signaled in advance. I also didn't find soft-spoken, baby-faced Audie Murphy very convincing as a devastatingly efficient killer; though when I looked up the dimly familiar name it turns out that he actually was.

Still, pretty interesting, and at 75 minutes the film doesn't outstay its welcome.

Museums
Saw the Richard Long exhibition. Contemporary British artist who goes on long walks and then exhibits pictures and maps.

Great way to make a living, but didn't think much of most of it. Some of the photos are pretty decent landscapes, but the conceptual stuff leaves me cold.

However, there is one great installation: a huge room with coloured rocks laid out in circles and shapes. Has a great feel of Zen simplicity.

Overall, worth dropping in if you've got a membership, but I'd think twice about laying out cold cash for it.

Slideshow, review, review, review.

Museums 2
Also dropped in at the Luke Fowler exhibition at the Serpentine on the way back. I'm never very keen on video installations though, and this seemed pretty tedious too.

Web
Great interview with new English Democrat Mayor of Doncaster: audio, transcript. (MeFi).

Video. Benefits of divided Salli saddle chair seat explained. Deadline post-it note stop-motion. Car hits train.

Pics. Gunfighters (MeFi). Old School Medicine (MeFi). Nice headline. Girl band flow chart. Nice Dinosaur Comics Guest Week gimmick. Saddam's palaces.

Article. Major, Hurd on constitution.

Economics. David Smith on election, end of recession. Baumol's cost disease. Why plus sizes are not stocked.

Update [2009-6-14 21:19:46 by TheophileEscargot]: Paul Krugman talks to Will Hutton:

PK: Well, the UK has achieved a lot of monetary traction in the way that no one else has through the depreciation of the pound. In effect, you've carried out a successful beggar-my-neighbour devaluation.

WH: So, the United Kingdom might actually get through this in reasonably good shape?

PK: Yeah. That's why I've been watching with an outsider's slight puzzlement, your bizarre political circus.

Random. What you would have won if you put the same lottery numbers on every week. Dogs don't look guilty. Texas town bans "hell" from "hello". Homeless in The Sims.