Contributing to the Economy

[intertext]

So I joined the thronging masses of boxing day shoppers and did my bit for the local economy (well, that's one excuse). I met a couple of friends downtown, and we shopped and had lunch at the Cafe Vieux Montreal and shopped some more. I bought no less than two pairs of shoes, two turtlenecks, one lambswool cardigan and a couple of books (the new Ian Rankin and the Alice Sheldon biography, both 30% off). Oh, and I got a couple of calendars, already 50% off: a beardie one for home and a garden one for my office at the college.

On the way home I considered braving Futureshop but found it too much of a zoo and decided to wait until later to seek out geeky pleasures. My new Mac needs some software to make it happy - I need a Mac version of Photoshop and possibly Office for Mac. I balk at Office, but so much of my work related files are done on Word, not to mention what my students send me. I can also consider doing some online cruising for bargains.

Then I came home and ate cold turkey and left-over salad and watched "The Devil Wears Prada" on dvd, which was silly but entertaining.

Comments

[inaniac.livejournal.com]

You could always try OpenOffice (http://www.openoffice.org/). Cross compatability is supposed to be good. I keep meaning to try it, but have not yet gotten around to it and my uni has a "microsoft at home" licence.

As for photoshop, there's The Gimp (http://www.gimp.org/macintosh/) or The GimpShop (http://plasticbugs.com/?page_id=294), but it looks like both of them for the unix geeks (which I am endeavouring to become, but have not yet done).


BTW, have you found the two finger scroll and the three finger right click? It's just soooo smooth.

[intertext.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the tip! I'd discovered the two finger scroll, but had been wondering if there was a "right click" function.

I'd been thinking about OpenOffice and may try it out. I have a feeling that there's no real substitute for Photoshop. Rather tiresomely, I had just acquired a copy of the full version from a friend (for Windows, of course), and now am going to have to downgrade again to Elements. Oh well. I love my Mac so far :)