My dad has been a PC guy as long as I can remember. And because he used to write security software for banks, he’d always have the cutting edge computer, and I’d get last year’s model. I was the only kid on the block who had a IBM PC Jr. Come to think of it, I was the only kid on the block period. But that’s beside the point. The point is that I’ve grown up on a steady diet of mashed up PC parts.
Well, I grew up and things started changing. My voice began to crack. I grew hair (singular) on my chest. And for the first time in my life, I was buying my own technology. I was also teaching at the time at a school that started their staff off at $13.8k a year, so I went cheap. But I wasn’t fooling anyone. I had my heart set on a sleek music player from the *other side*. I tried to get a free one, but that ended badly. Finally, I took my first step towards liberalism and bought an iPod.
Then I fell in love.
I couldn’t help but think, “if they’ve done such a bang up job with their music player, I wonder how their computers are.” Now, keep in mind, I grew up believing that Mac for Dummies was an oxymoron. It was the “computer for idiots”. I knew every little nook and cranny of my PC, and I could make it do anything I wanted it to (except work reliably). But I couldn’t shake the jonesing.
So after several months of a whiny dropcash campaign, I finally bit the bullet and bought my first Mac. It took me a few weeks to get the hang of things. Keyboard shortcuts were a big sticking point at first, and I’m still fumbling around with the terminal; but it’s like rehab. Tough at first, but OH the freedom! Nearly everything makes sense about how this machine works. I’m constantly being surprised at how well OSX anticipates what I’m trying to do and makes the job easy for me.
So I’m hereby tossing my emachines laptop to the curb (catch, Nate!) and in it’s place there’s a PowerPC G4 with only a few highway miles under the hood. Now I can take the OSX (o so xactly right) experience with me wherever I go. And if anyone would like to join me in partaking of the fruit (pay no attention to that logo, my friend!), I have piles and piles of resources for anyone making the switch. I doubt you’d regret it.
