The more things change, the more they stay the same.

When I was a kid, I used to carry around the Sears December catalogue (the one with the huge toy section in the middle) after I had marked it up with multi-colored circles (representing changes of mind over the course of time - like a movie script - I had to create a color key for Santa to understand which selections had been abandoned and which ones were the most current) as if it where a magical totem capable of fulfilling all desires. Because, of course, for a kid, it was.

This past weekend I have discovered that I have not lost that behavior. Apple has finally come out with a $500 Macintosh. It's not all that powerful, and it doesn't come with anything else - that being a monitor, keyboard, or mouse. (The assumption is you have those already, so just re-use them.) But, being a fan of Mac from the beginning, and horsing around with Wintel machines most of my professional career, I pine for the simplicity and sleekness of a Mac. (Especially since I spent the weekend re-loading drivers on our home Windows machines, just so the damn things would recognize standard devices, like a monitor.) So, I printed the pages that describe the MacMini, and found myself orbiting back around to where I set them down, picking them back up and re-reading the same few pages over and over. I am in the full throws of techno-lust. I want a MacMini BAD!