neurological dryer lint

guess i'm not as intractable as i always thought i would be, walking into an apple store and purchasing a computer from them. there was the streak, the part of me that couldn't help but mock their arrogant self-importance, but another side of my psyche, the proverbial angel on my shoulder, tried to keep the former at bay. it was fairly successful - i did walk out with a new macbook, 2.0Ghz core duo, 1GB of RAM, "super" drive (their cute term for a DVDRW), and a shiny new ipod nano for renee (which was free, sweetness). the educator's discount was a great help, too, knocking a solid $400 off the total package, including tax exemption.

it was sold to us by katherine "robi" robinson, oak hills grad and recent UC architecture grad, who some of you may remember. she tolerated my occasional snide remarks about the apple way. i couldn't help it, though, especially when you say "i'm buying that laptop" and they say "congratulations" like i just won a prize. see, in the consumer - company relationship, you are happy when i choose your product and give you my business. i'm not bowing and scraping before you because i have been chosen as one from many to be blessed with your product.

poor girl, surprised she didn't punch me.

OSX does still feel like a child's toy. mainly because i've used windows for fifteen years now, DOS for a few before that, and the C=64 command line beyond that horizon. i don't like OS's that make you do SO much with the bloody mouse. in time i will learn the keyboard shortcuts (and i hear that an app called quicksilver is magical for app management too). after a few hours' use i'm still baffled by the fact that so many apps stay running after i X out of them. gotta get used to option-Q or whatever.

other things on my list to learn:

• the equivalent of shift-delete. i never needed a recycle bin, i certainly don't need a trash can.
  
• what to do with all this wasted space. i am a person who maximizes whatever window i have open - having windows smaller than the whole screen makes my skin crawl. the maximize button expands the active window to the vertical resolution but not to the horizontal. argh.
  
• changing disk partition names - my windows partition on the system is sitting on my desktop labeled "untitled". that's not cool.
  
• so when you download software, you get a .DMG file, which, when opened, drops another little file on your desktop, and then you open that file/folder/whatever, drag what's in it to a buried, obscure "Applications" folder, and that installs the app? didn't someone say this was an intuitive OS?
  

enough whining about OSX. this is a nice piece of hardware. i dig the size and weight, the keyboard, the screen is beautiful. it's a little noisy, but working with servers all day, i don't notice. it is a tad warm, but i think that'll ultimately be a good thing for my wife, who uses blankets and space heaters in august. i have a "trapper keeper" sleeve on the way.

and it is the fastest windows machine i have ever used. bootcamp was a breeze, installation was flawless. i still can't believe how snappy it is, and i've run this OS on four-CPU monster servers. the drivers CD that is burned during the bootcamp setup process doesn't provide solid drivers for the onboard isight camera - opening it in windows bluescreens the OS. and there are about a half dozen other items in device manager that are missing drivers, but apparently the MSI that bootcamp builds doesn't include them.

i can't frickin right click in windows without an external mouse. argh.

i still have a little setup to do in windows to get it ready for renee to use, and lots o' intarweb-scouring to iron out the little issues. i know a few of you have used this OS (hamrick, trujillo, etc) - anyone with any useful tips or hints, fire away, i will absorb them like a delicious sauce.