March 2006

Take Control of Maintaining Your Mac

Today marks the release of my ninth Take Control ebook, Take Control of Maintaining Your Mac. Based on votes received, this was the title more readers than any other were keen to get their hands on, and I’m delighted to have been able to oblige. This ebook covers everything you need to know to keep your Mac performing at its best, as well as reducing the risk of serious problems (and making recovery easier if problems do occur). I think it makes a splendid companion to my earlier, and extremely popular, Take Control of Mac OS X Backups, and so do the Take Control publishers: you can purchase the two volumes together for only $15, a 25% discount off the individual prices.

This was an interesting ebook to write, in that many of the tasks I cover provoke heated disagreement, even among Mac experts. How often should you empty your Trash, repair permissions, install software updates, or defragment your hard disk? Is a surge protector or uninterruptable power supply really a necessity? Is it important to get rid of old, unused files even if you have plenty of space on your disk? Should you care about those built-in daily, weekly, and monthly maintenance scripts that Mac OS X may or may not try to run in the middle of the night? As the ebook went through our usual technical review process, we got tons of comments on topics like these from about a dozen different Mac experts, and some of the exchanges were quite lively. Instead of simply saying, “This is the One Right Way,” I decided to include some of the comments expressing other points of view in a series of sidebar conversations, so that readers can judge for themselves what the best approach is for them.

I have plenty more ebooks ahead, but I’m planning to take a break for a couple of months to concentrate on some other projects that have been getting too little attention. And yes, the long-rumored resurrection of Interesting Thing of the Day is among them! I can’t commit to a particular (re-)launch date yet, but new content is definitely on the way, along with a complete site redesign, a new logo, new features, and more yaddas than you can shake a stick at.

March 9, 2006 by Joe Kissell Books Mac Stuff

Thin Mint

Like many people in the United States, I’ve had a lifelong fondness for Girl Scout cookies, and like a considerable percentage of Girl Scout cookie fans, my favorite variety has always been Thin Mint.

Of course, you can’t purchase Girl Scout cookies just any old time; you can buy them only during their brief annual sales drive, and even then, only if you happen to be in the right place at the right time. Unfortunately, you can’t always predict when and where you might run into a Girl Scout with cookies to sell. Generally, the pattern has been that I find them in front of the subway station when I’m in a hurry and have no cash, and can’t find them when I have both time and money. But, when the planets have aligned and I’ve discovered a source under the right circumstances, I’ve always bought as many boxes as I could, which has invariably turned out to be two (plus the Samoas that Morgen’s especially fond of).

If I exercise the utmost self control and ration myself severely, two boxes of Thin Mint cookies will last about two months. So when, in July or October, I have the inevitable craving for Thin Mint cookies, I’m completely out of luck. (And don’t get me started on other brands of thin chocolate-mint cookies. They Just Aren’t The Same.) Of course, I’ll get another craving in January or February, and that’s when I start thinking: Hmmmm, Girl Scout cookie season approaches soon. Remember to be on the lookout.

So last week, I was worrying out loud that I may have missed the sales drive this year—I didn’t see any Girl Scouts outside the subway station and didn’t know where else to find them. Then yesterday evening, when I met Morgen after work to see Match Point, we walked right by a little stand on the sidewalk where two or three young girls and their adult helper were cheerfully proffering cookies. Oh yeah.

I had to go down the block to get some extra cash, but I returned 10 minutes later and waited in line. When the youngest of the girls present asked me what I wanted, I said, “I’d like a full case of the Thin Mints”—her eyes got really big—“and two boxes of Samoas.” It took the adult helper a few moments to calculate how much that would cost ($49 in all, probably the single largest cookie purchase of my life). But I think I made some scouts very happy, and I know I made myself very happy.

Of course, then we had to lug all those boxes to the theater and back, and they were pretty heavy. (Morgen helpfully noted that the weight would soon shift from the box to my midsection.) But it was worth the effort.

I still have to ration them, but now I can reliably count on having at least one Thin Mint cookie every single day until next year’s drive. Life is good.

March 4, 2006 by Joe Kissell Food & Drink