I need to finish migrating from wheezy old PC to spanking new iMac this weekend, but there’s something stopping me: inclination. My contrary streak is getting in the way.
I think I’ve realised that I like the idea of owning a Mac (or being a Mac owner) again much more than I actually like owning one.Â
I’m not enjoying relearning all my workflows for photos. I hate the mean little mouse with its irritating nipple and the way its range doesn’t match my learnt gestures. It’s a bit too quiet and too clutter-free. It’s not (yet) lived up to the promise of providing this super-simple, clean, fast interface for maximising my media.
Worse, I’m not sure I can live up to its promise: the rest of my life isn’t clutter-free and most aspects of living don’t “just work”. I’m the queen of kludge in all things: learning to be as suave and sophisticated as the lump of perspex on the desk is daunting.
The Mac’s got all my files on it now, so there’s nothing stopping me from getting on with life as a Mac owner. Sure, there are a few files I need to hoik over, still: bookmarks and the like - but nothing that’s going to take a lot of energy or time to complete.Â
I’ve been good, though. I’ve forced myself to use the Mac exclusively since I got it, and despite temptation to return to the programmes and mouse and so on I’m familiar with, I’ve been good and haven’t strayed. So at some point this weekend, I should be able to dismantle the PC which has sat beside the Mac on the desk all week, and consign it to live out the rest of the year under the desk, despite my best intentions to do something constructive and/or worthy and/or profitable with it.
But not just yet.
Thank god! Someone else who doesn’t quite love Macs too. I’ve been forced to use them this past month as I’ve been living in Apple Mac households and about .5 seconds after appreciated the sheer gorgeousness of them (there’s two and now I’m staying with a new friend who also bloody ahs them too) and the kudos they come with I’m mighty pissed off that the fact that IT DOESN’T MAKE ANY SENSE AT ALL. Or at least not to a very experienced PC user like myself. Grrrrrr…
Why I needed to share that with a complete stranger, I’ve no idea. Although it reassuring to know I’m not the only one.
Nice blog.
I’m fairly agnostic about the differences between MS and Apple, switching between them all the time anyway. But I wouldn’t touch iPhoto with a bargepole - all it ever does is seem to freeze up when you’ve got a lot of pics in it.
Actually, most of the iLife stuff is fairly useless to me.
But if you’ve got an Intel Mac can’t you dual boot with Windows and stick with some of the things you know and like and that work better?
I couldn’t stand to use a PC after using a Mac for so long, but equally, I couldn’t stand to use an Apple mouse. If you favour the mouse that you were using with your PC, when not use it with your iMac?
What Brian said. Whilst I admire your resoluteness in changing platform, there’s no need to make things unnecessarily hard on yourself - and despite being a long-term Mac owner and convert, I’d still recommend ditching that Mighty Mouse asap. I’ve never understood the appeal of them, and have a pair of Microsoft mice that fly around the system just fine.
True that. My mac’s quite beautiful with my logitech mouse by its side. I owned a mac mouse, but once I decided that I could do more with my trackpad I just gave it away.
By the way, I’ve been reading your blog since I was 13 years old (notsosoft dayz), now I’m 20. I love your writing. Thnx fer seven years of reading.
The mouse is a bit less responsive than a PC one, I do agree.. but I am still trying to fine tune that. I did think I had broken the wheely thing at one point. Right click on a mouse is nice in a rebellious kinda way on a mac. It’s almost like a naughty pleasure in the middle of a very healthy detoxifying diet you know you should really be following.
In other news, AIM on my mac dies at least 14 times a day which I find kinda ironic…