Did I Mention I REALLY Love My iMac?

I am head over heels in love with my iMac. I should have switched years ago. I only did switch because the world of Microsoft kept slowing down my PC, and I just got tired of it. I got tired of the continual security upgrades, and the continual slowness of the machine.

Now my iMac is my buddy. I've had my machine for a while, and I thought getting use to it would be really difficult. Guess again. So when I go to the Apple store for my hand holding, it's a shorter and shorter meeting because I can't think of anything else I need to learn right now. However, I have not delved into the really fun stuff, like the Garage Band, or the iMovie. But I plan to.

Stump the One to Ones

I have signed up with Apple to have my hand held for one year as I transition from PC mode to iMac wonderland. This feature, which is really quite nice, costs me $99, and I gladly paid it, because I really believed it would be VERY difficult to get used to the oddness of the Macintosh computer. Instead, I am learning at a brisk pace WITHOUT the hand holding. In fact, I am finding that I continually stump the Mac experts with my questions about how to do something using Apple software, that I could do using the Microsoft products.
The last time I was there, I asked a question about Numbers to see if the columns could be formatted to accept telephone numbers. The woman who was my expert, didn't know. And, as the clock was ticking (I only get an hour at a time) she began to look on line to see if she could find the answer. Well DUH! I could have done that at home.
So shortly I have another appointment with my One to One expert. Questions I want to answer, like how to make great blogs, can't be answered because they aren't an Apple issue.

Oh, they do discuss web pages, but that is because they are permoting the .mac account, which I refuse to purchase.

Mighty Mouse Update

I visited the Apple store yesterday. This time, I headed straight for the smarties in the back of the room--the Geniuses. My mouse pointer was doing all sorts of whacky things, like suddenly zooming from the middle of the screen to one of the corners, or scooting along the bottom of the screen. I wasn't doing anything wrong, I sware. It had to be a flawed mouse. So I made an appointment with a Genius in the Portland Apple store who could analyze the situation. Just in case, I brought the flawed beast.

I spoke to a nice person who listened very carefully. Then I brought out my errant mouse, and he plugged it into his Power Book. While we were talking, he was moving the mouse in circular motions to see if it would malfunction. Of course it did not. However he did say, and this is why I am sharing this information with you, that the laser on the bottom of the Mighty Mouse is so sensitive, a mouse pad with text or a logo could send the mouse pointer into zany fits. He recommended a solid colored mouse pad. At the Genius Bar, the smarties don't even use a mouse pad, just the top of the desk.

This got me thinking. I not only have a mouse pad with text on it, I have five hairy cats that constantly shed fine hairs. Could my environment have been the culpret?

My Genius was kind enough to exchange my possiblely damaged mouse with a brand new, right out of the box mouse.

I took the new mouse home and it is resting comfortably on top of a sheet of white paper, not a cushy mouse pad, but a firm, no nonsense flat service. You know what? All has been perfect ever since the mouse's resting place has been changed. Imagine that!

Computer Cats

I have five cats, and from time to time all of them visit me while I'm at the computer. Pooh is one of the cats. Since I have gotten my iMac, it has become easier to have Pooh, and the others, lay next to me because the keyboard and wiring has been greatly reduced. I can actually push the keyboard way back and the cats can do the "catwalk" in front of the keyboard instead of on top of the keyboard before. You can see Smokey laying right next to my old PC keyboard. Notice how thick the keyboard is compared to the iMac's!


The cats like to look outside the window when they are in my work room. So I have tried to make their stay as comfortable as possible. Here are Tigger [brother to Pooh] and Cat resting comfortably by the window, just a step away from me.

One to One

This is my personal Apple One to One coach. He's getting ready for our first meeting, and was a little annoyed that I paused long enough to take a photo shot. I brought with me a notebook that recorded my concerns, and things I was curious about. Because I am special, he went into the back room and brought out my very own OnetoOne journal, so I could keep current with the information.

Problem is, some of the info I wanted was not Apple's responsibility. I wanted to know about Open Source Software, and how in the heck I could get the X11 to become active. Not Apple's responsibility. I also am terribly interested in The Gimp, a free version of Photoshop. Not Apple's responsibility. Or, how about formatting a column in Numbers so that it would automatically display a list of numbers as phone numbers. He hadn't learned that yet.


Well gee. I did learn about Expose and that I could have a live chat using iChat, and not pay for .Mac, so that was nice. Oh yes, I also wanted to know how to get the photos in a blog to line up properly. Not Apple's responsibility.

Anyhow. The Apple store in Portland is in a central location, and constantly busy. Apple must be doing pretty good because there were plenty of customer service people there. They are so young. Doesn't anyone over 40 use a Mac?

Mighty Mouse

Common, Apple, this mouse looks like a bar of soap. There is nothing wrong with a visible right click button. And, there should be some type of invisible fence on the mousepad so that one is not rolling over the entire desk to move an object on screen.

Wouldn't it be wonderful?

Wouldn't it be wonderful if everything you wanted to learn would just be absorbed into your head, like osmosis? Suppose one could place a book or even a program disk under one's pillow at night, and while sleeping, everything from that object was placed in just the right place in the brain.

Imagine the conversations! Sharing coffee with friends would have a whole new meaning.

Since I have converted over from PC to Mac, there are some frustrations. Just getting around the desktop and finding files has proven to be a bit of a challenge. My mouse has no obvious right click button, and the pointer mysteriously zooms to one of the four courners on occasion--hum, that is a bit strange.

So wouldn't it be nice to go to bed with my new iMac and wake up in the morning with all the basics about operation placed in just the right spot inside my brain.