Quaint

Kristin says that I have a quaint life.

Hmm ... Maybe we should rename The Lodge and make it Quaint Acres?

Quaint (according to Wikipedia):

1. Having old-fashioned charm.
   • It's a very quaint village with old-fashioned storefronts.
2. Strange or odd in an interesting, pleasing, or amusing way.
   • came forth a quaint and fearful sight - Sir Walter Scott
3. Highly incongruous, inappropriate, or illogical; naive, unreasonable -- usually used ironically.
   • of a quaint sense of honesty - Paul Engle
     
4. (obsolete) Characterized by cleverness or ingenuity; skillfully wrought or artfully contrived.
   • to show how quaint an orator you are - Shakespeare
5. (obsolete) Overly discriminating or needlessly meticulous, fastidious.
   • being too quaint and finical in his expression - Roger L'Etrange
     

The first thing that came to my mind was the opening of Poe's "The Raven":

Once upon a midnight dreary while I pondered weak and weary
over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore...

I suppose it is quaint, certainly compared to the life I led in Chicago or DC. Small towns do lend themselves to quaint more than major urban centers, I suppose. For one thing, there simply is nowhere to go. When I lived in Hyde Park, I was within an easy walk of the Oriental Institute Museum at the University of Chicago, of the Museum of Science and Industry, of two Starbucks and at least one other coffee shop where one could sip coffee, watch people and read the newspapers for hours. There were five or six Thai restaurants within a five block radius, and I could hop a bus or train and be in downtown Chicago in no time. Walk out to Promontory Point or along Lake Michigan. Visit a half dozen Unique Thrift Sores. Peruse the used books at Powell's and check out the freebies they left on the sidewalk. Go to the Field Museum or the aquarium or the planetarium, all conveniently located on the Museum Campus by the lake.

Here when all gets deadly dull, you can ... visit the Craft Mall or the Antique Mall. Get a senior coffee at McDonald's. Drift through WalMart or, on an upscale day and with a coupon, Kohl's.

Admittedly, there is the river and the dells and the woods. And even the little railway. And good small local libraries. If either of us were gamblers -- and we are way too prudent and too cheap -- we could hit the casino. But really ...

Maybe it is bucolic, more than quaint, in the sense that my own life seems more rural than village-ish, and I think villages are quaint. There are quaint villages and towns around here, but the trinket shops and waterparks render Wisconsin Dells and Lake Delton far from quaint.

My life is not really bucolic, at least not in the sense of actually having a herd of sheep or cows. I am not sure a flock of flamingos counts. And while Jerry has a passle of barn cats up on his farm, I am not sure that a herd of cats is any more imaginable than a square circle. One can say it, but what could it possibly mean?

Anyway, today I did laundry, including the linens from the guestroom so that we can get that ready of Michelangelo's arrival. Then I went to the library -- where I am even now -- to work on the history of Holy Hill a bit. I did make some progress there, which is a good feeling. Tonight after Tom gets home, he will probably iron shirts while I watch The Big Bang and/or read more about ancient Rome or the Maya.

I just noticed that all three of the books I bought on Saturday have the name of the same guy in them. I don't know him, or even if he lives in the Dells, but we have disturbingly similar interests, book-wise. I mentioned it to Laura, my supervisor at the library, and she suggested I call him and tell him to just give me his books instead of going through the library. That way we can just cut out the middle man.

How quaint.