Mac daddy.

I made love to my new iBook on Tuesday night.

That was our first night together - a magical time, filled with lust and exploration.


...okay, so no love-making. But I'm thoroughly impressed.

I went ahead, last Thursday, and bought the iBook G4. I didn't get the PowerBook, like I had originally planned, because it was a bit too expensive and I didn't really need all that computing power.

Right now I'm surfing speedily along on the internet via a wireless connection at the Thunderbird Coffee House. It was so easy, and the connection is so fast. You can't get this kind of service at home. Plus the coffee is good.

What I ordered: iBook G4, wireless mouse, Microsoft Office.

The funny thing is all this stuff came seperately. I got the mouse first, then the Mac (it was like Christmas when I saw the box sitting on my coffee table), then the Office. But whatever, it came.

It's been a bit of an adjustment, with this OS X "Tiger" stuff. For instance - I miss the litte bar at the bottom of Windows that you can just click to bring the window up. On a Mac, they're all stacked on top of each other, or on the dock (the little menu at the bottom). And so many things I take for granted on a PC - alt+ctrl+delete say - I'm having to re-learn here.

But it's a beauty. My iBook has this cool thing called Dashboard. You click it, and up pops a bunch of mini programs. The time, a sticky-note pad, a system resources monitor - all right up front. Plus I downloaded such nifty "Widgets" as an English/German translator, a cocktail recipe program (just type in "Cosmopolitan" and it gives you in the ingredients), a window that notifies my when I receive my Gmail, and a little version of Pac-Man.

There's also the standards: iTunes, iDVD, the web browser Safari, and Garage Band, a program that lets you write and play your own music. I haven't experimented with that just yet.

The machine itself is gorgeous. Slick whites and greys with the little glowing apple on the back - plus the trackpad has scrolling capabilities when you use two fingers. And finally - finally! - I can burn my own damn CDs.

Yes, life is good. I've been playing with my iBook all week (including a super-late night on Tuesday; I was up until 1:30 a.m.) and am learning new things every day. Eventually I'll pick up some sort of "how-to" instructions, but for now I just want to play.

And the Mac lets me.

Know some tricks? Be sure and let me know, because there's so much I don't know.

Oh, and thanks to everyone who provided feedback. It really was a tough choice. But now I've got everything (the Office software, especially) to be productive and do what I want, and at about the same price as the PCs I was looking at.

Now if I can just find Illustrator or PhotoShop dirty cheap somewhere...