>Well no matter what the e-universe ends up offering, I use the dictionary as a parallel to TamarG's newspaper...
>When I grab my dictionary I have a little contest with myself to see how close I can get to the word just by feel (without even looking at the book itself).
>1 in 1000 I'm dead on but probably 8 out of 10 I'm reasonably close (a few pages off - 10 or less).
>Then starts my search for the actual word. First I check to rationalize why I landed where I did. Then I look at the "index words", and often I say to myself 'oh yea, I was going to lookup xxxxx a few days back and it's close by so I'll do it now". Or I'll see a word in my peripheral vision on the page that catches my eye so I read its definition.
>Finally, on to the word I wanted originally. When I find it I can see, without further 'action', words that may be closely related or words that are also worth a gander. So I have a looksee at them too.
>
>I'd lose all this good stuff with an electronic "dictionary", purposefully put in quotes because it shouldn't really be called the same thing when it can't do (for me and lots of people I'm sure) what a dictionary can do.
>

My husband talks about how he would do research in college and law school. Go to the shelf where a book he needed was located and look not only at that book, but at others near it.

I use a similar strategy sometimes in the library looking for non-fiction things to read. I'll go to the shelves for a topic that interests me and just browse until I find something.

Tmar