Early Christmas

I got a new toy this week. The new computer we ordered for work back in September finally arrived. It had quite a journey. Keith placed the order requisition, which went to purchasing, where they filed it appropriately. According to Apple, it would take about 7-10 days to arrive. Just about a week later, Apple announced their new line of iMacs (the computer we ordered), with a host of new gadgets built in. I was a little disappointed, but you can't ever be too upset about computers, since they are basically obsolete by the time they go into production. So, after a couple more weeks of convincing myself I didn't really want the new gizmos anyway, we checked on the status of my computer. Apparently the people who filed the order appropriately did so before actually ordering it. Of course, when they tried again (a month late), the model we had ordered was discontinued. So we promptly put in an order for the new iMac, with all the new gizmos... 2-3 weeks for delivery. After three weeks, I started asking about the status. The first response I got was, "yeah I faxed it, " to which I replied, "does that mean that someone received the fax and the computer is coming?" Silence. Next, we tried the Apple distributor in Sydney, who apparently only answers the phone after the fifth message on her machine. Once we finally got through, they told us that they had just received a shipment from Singapore, but that wasn't the shipment with my computer. Two more weeks. During the course of this sleuthing, our secretary had contacted everyone she knows in the chain of mail receiving and distribution at the university, which, despite being only a handful of people, is the entire chain of people responsible for recieving mail and getting it where it should be on campus. So, everyone who might be involved at the university, knew that it was expected, and they were prepared to phone me when it got to them. Two weeks later, we called Sydney (five times) and found out that it had been shipped to Darwin by express courier (which takes 3 days to get to Darwin). So, on Monday, Gloria (our receptionist) got a call from receiving that the computer had arrived, and it showed up at my door that afternoon. It only took 9 weeks to get an item that was supposed to arrive after 7-10 days.

So, the flip side of that story is that the new computer is great, and I'm still trying to figure out how to use all of those gizmos. It also means that I don't have to lug my laptop back and forth to the office every day, which is nice. Now, normally, I hate transferring computers because it takes weeks to make the new computer work as well as the old one. There is some sort of paradox there because the new one is always faster, bigger, more powerful, etc., but it never has all of the personalized touches that make it feel comfortable. Well, Apple solved this with the new operating system, by letting you connect the new computer to the old one, and set up the new one with exactly the same settings, software and files as the old one. It seems to be basically seamless. In not much more time that it took to back up everything, the new computer was running just the way I like it, only faster. Now I just need to figure out the old two computer problem (keeping track of work I do on each one, so that when I switch, I still have all the files I just changed), which I'll figure out soon.

An update on the knee - the swelling was down enough to get a better diagnosis in this week's physio appointment. It seems to be a cartillage problem, though it also doesn't seem to be torn enough to have an obnoxious flap wreaking havoc on joint mobility. We are all optimistic that it is just minor abuse (bruised?), and that it will not require surgery.