old books are sexy

But apparently only when they don't apply to whatever my topic is. Go figure. I've spent the last hour and a half in the library poking about for geographical tidbits; it's incredibly frustrating searching in utterly random places for one tiny bit of information and having to go entirely elsewhere for the next bit that makes the whole thing sensible. And the problem is, I don't know in the beginning whether it's going to be sensible or not--I have to hope so by the end, or else it's all for nothing.
Tell me again why history is on my list of possible majors?

But on the other hand, my distractions are lovely. I found this large book of old city maps, circa 1890's I think...the old, steel-engraved and hand-coloured style. The kind that makes me go all histoy-wibbly and weak at the knees. Mmm, gorgeousness. (I will run a small secondhand bookstore and have books like this in stock, and drink lots of tea.)

Right. Research. (Etymology? Re-Search. Searching again. Why, I ask, do I have to do it all over again if someone's already done it for me? --That was ironic and rhetorical. I know why. I just don't like it sometimes. Economic treatises written in 1959 are really, really boring.)