Hello, I'm a Mac
Let me preface this by admitting I'm a snob. My family has used nothing but Macs and never will buy anything else. Heck, we've even got an original Mac Classic that still works--if you don't mind its quaint 8 Mhz processor and 512 KB RAM. Yeah, it might as well be Pong in this day and age, given that you'd need a garage full of them just to hold a basic browser now.
Mac's GUI is what Windows has endeavored to copy--so badly--from the start. In attempting to pretend to be "different," they simply managed to turn things sideways, set things contrary to what seems logical, and despite the fact that every "upgrade" has only compounded the problems, managed to market their mishmash to the brown-shoed squares who made it the standard in the business world. Forget that Windows is continually duct-taping patches upon patches and is prone to crashes and conflicts. It's beige, it's business, and business isn't cool, right? They've even convinced people that Macs are too pricey--despite the fact that they actually have a longer working life. Now with Unix humming along behind the scenes of OS X, it's even more stable. Like the Dyson, the Mac is not just hip, cool, elegant, and kicks ***, it's the best man for the job. Heck, you don't even need to pay for special software to play with the suits because there are perfectly good open source counterparts to MS Office for FREE in Open Office in several incarnations. I can do cool graphics and spreadsheets. Heck, even the US Navy decided long ago that Apple servers were the solution and are on their way to embracing Mac as the standard. I don't know about you, but when you're talking about nuclear warheads and global crises that might come up, do you really want to have to worry about that Windows Blue Screen of Death?
So what has me up on my high horse? Well, it's partly the mortification I suffer when I have to go to work and use a peecee. I hate everything about that workstation, and it doesn't even use Vista. I'm sure it's partly because I "grew up" on a Mac, but everything out this is counterintuitive. Nothing works the way it should and nothing is simple. Things I should be able to customize, I can't. I've been spoiled. But no, what's really got me irked is that I'm six chapters into my new Computers in Healthcare text and though they give a shout out to Mac OS and Unix, it's allll about Windoze. I suppose I'll end up learning something about those boring spreadsheets in the end, but holy cow, this is not going to be one of those classes that makes me rabidly enthusiastic. It should, however, go very quickly. /whine
On other fronts, did anyone happen to notice it's MT Appreciation Week? Apparently, those of us who got the obligatory pat on the back should consider ourselves lucky because I don't see anyone kicking their heels up. Even the the biggest and busiest MT forum hasn't mentioned it this year. It's usually good, at least, for one of those threads where people commiserate about how little recognition they got. It's kind of a sad commentary when even the MTs don't notice the occasion.
Lastly, for those of you who are wondering, I can officially verify that the 70s were indeed the decade of fine sleeping. Aside from dropping a very large piece of lumber on my foot in an attempt to break it, I did indeed succeed in setting up the new waterbed. I'm a little disappointed that it's more deluxe than my old one (this is almost waveless), but I broke it in by going comatose for 14 hours straight and have had to fight my daughter for it for the last week. Best $25 I've spent all year.