Windows 8, I'm leaving you, forever

I'm a Mac user now, and in my first hour, I'm enjoying it already.  I think I can figure this Apple-part out.

Last month, my notebook which performed fine service for three years, died.  It was everything I wanted from a home computer, dependable, predictable and useful.

When I went to replace it the folks at Best Buy foisted off upon me an Acer Notebook with Windows 8.  What a miserable two months I have had!

Windows 8 is an unholy mess.  I don't know what's wrong with Acer but always, always, it would take the opportunity to either start inserting my typed letters into the middle of a prior sentence at random times (I don't look at the screed as I type) or slowing down to glacial slowness for no particular reason, to where I frequently had to turn off my computer and restart it.

Windows 8 is tile-driven or tile-centric or something and things would come in from the sides randomly or else I couldn't find anything.  I found myself using the Microsoft key constantly, as my only known route to get out of whatever screen I had been randomly placed in to get back to the desktop.

Somehow, when I lost my tool bars for 3 days and was really at sea, I transformed my screensaver button or refresh button (who knows?) to one minute.  So forevermore the screen would turn to gibberish (tiles) if I didn't move the cursor every 60 seconds.

Do you know how maddening that is?  I spent days, unsuccessfully, looking for the app or process or control that modifies this and never found it because the system was evidentially designed by a bunch of 2d grader idiot savants sitting in a sandbox clutching a pet/wish list with no adult supervision and no regard for consumer use.   .

So today I got rid of my $800 investment in Microsoft and went out and bought a Mac system, for even more money.  I could no longer tolerate that Windows 8 system in my home and I got rid of it!

Already I like my Mac, even though it's different from what I am used to, it's elegant and seemingly intuitive in a manner like I tend to be.  Microsoft threw each next system operating version in your face and if it blinded you, well, they didn't care one whit.

Still Running

Last week I started my weekly running off with a solo 5-mile run around my greater neighborhood on a clockwise loop.  That was the first of five runs that week for 23 miles.  It feels good to get my number of running days back to five, no matter how temporarily, and bump the weekly mileage up past my post-injury absolute cutoff of 20 miles.  We'll see if it lasts.

Today I had no one to run with so I set off at 8 a.m. to do the same loop counterclockwise.  Within half a mile I was returning home, my legs felt leaden from the 5.8 miles I did yesterday, and it was raining lightly.

What a wimp!  At 9 a.m. I went back out, intending to do a mile, my absolute minimum for being able to call a run a run.  I was toiling through my neighborhood mile, adding a little extra to make it a 2K run instead of a mere mile, when I found myself by the W&OD Trail.  What the heck, I thought, and I headed out on my loop, counterclockwise.

Forty-eight minutes later I was back after doing 5 1/4 miles in reverse of last week's run.  It felt so great I immediately went shopping after my shower and bought more clearance running toggery at Target (my staple) and a couple of super-fancy winter running jackets (the types that go for $60-$120 in running stores) in great shape and my size at the nearby Unique Thrift Super-store.  Yeah I love running, even if it plays with my head.