Technically, my laptop is an Apple. But Apples just turn brown and then fall apart. My current PowerBook G4 will soon turn into a MacBook Aluminum (Late 2008). That’s not a literal statement, of course. But with the Macintosh operating system’s built-in “Migration Assistant” and the fact that the software on my PBG4 is current, the transformation should appear pretty convincing.

I haven’t actually received the new MacBook just yet, but I’ve tracked the shipment and it is due here today. I’m pretty freakin’ excited. This is how Christmas morning felt when I was a child! I should calm down, though. There is, after all, a Failure-Out-of-Box possibility. An informal, small sample Macintouch Survey which included 260 MacBook users’ reports, showed an 11.1% initial failure rating (failures covering a wide range of issues). As this is a third generation MacBook, using pre-established concepts in a predominantly new design (they took what they learned from the first couple and started over with those lessons in mind) with pretty darned nice parts…. Well, it could go either way. I have never bought the first of any model of computer and though this could be argued as a third generation machine, it could just as easily be labeled an original design.

I’ve been plugging away on my increasingly slow-by-comparisoin laptop because I am not a graphics-based power user. My work consists of some processor-based number crunching with a little GUI design on top. Still, I’ve seen the speed of those Intel computers and wanted to hop on that zippy bandwagon for a while now. I very nearly purchased one of the black MacBooks as I could have gotten it at quite a bargain. But I stuck to my aesthetic guns on the basis that I wanted a small metal laptop. That’s why I got this 12″ PowerBook G4 in the first place!

When the MacBook Air was first announced, I practically leapt into my own computer’s display trying to grab for it: terribly thin, ridiculously light, and with the 13 inch form factor that replaces the 12 inch (for widescreen display purposes). Alas, it was too slow, too crippled, and too expensive for me to justify it to myself. If that MacBook Air had been released for $1200, or if it had contained more power, I might have been typing out my blogs on Air by now.

Instead, I waited. I had patience and confidence in my own excellent taste in design. I felt certain that my sensibilities would not go unrewarded! And sure enough, in October of 2008, Apple released the MacBook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008) and confirmed my suspicions that I’m always right. (Except for spelling the word ‘suspicion’ — I always have to look that up for some reason!) The specs were right, the pricing was right, and it looks quite pretty. I would wait no longer. O, how I would battle for days to reach… actually, I just requested a company discount and payment plan. It’s good to work somewhere you honestly enjoy the perquisites you’re given. As I await my new computer, I give you a geek-friendly, kinda-layperson-friendly comparison chart:

Even through my candy-cane tinted glasses, I can see that there is a distinction between good and bad Christmas decorations. A decoration is supposed to be something that adorns, enriches, and beautifies an object. A bad Christmas decoration is one that is so obtrusive that it draws attention to itself to the exclusion of whatever it’s supposed to be adorning. Or a bad decoration is one that does not enrich, but rather makes an object appear less beautiful than its original state.

That’s not to say that everyone should have my taste. I prefer greens and reds and whites and silvers in my decorations. I could understand if others prefer blues and golds and various other colors. I like my decorations to be simple and understated. I wouldn’t complain if decorations were just large and obvious.

Now, in contrast with decorations, there are objects of art. I’ve seen people put out nativity scenes under their tree or just out in their living rooms to stand as seasonal works of art and that’s fine. A nativity scene shows the traditionally recognized origin of the holiday, so it makes sense to have it displayed as a commemoration for the duration. If you like Santa Claus and want to display representations of him and his reindeer around inside and out of your home, that sounds reasonable, too.

Some examples of decorations that I would call bad would be the very large figures of snowmen, reindeer, Santa Claus, elves, Jesus Christ, the Three Wise Men, the nativity scene… Basically if the large figures are approximately the size of a human being, they have stopped being decorations and have started to become affronts to the people who choose to celebrate Christmas but still have a sense of aesthetics. Large lawn ornaments that move around or blink are not good. Words constructed out of lights — I’ve seen artists build that into something moving and thought-provoking, but “Merry Christmas” and “Ho Ho Ho” seem too obvious and derivative to be art. None of these things add beauty to a home or lawn, but somehow people seem to be willing to overlook that in the name of Christmas. I am not so willing.

A real snow man on a lawn is an understandable decoration — you gather up the snow that’s fallen in front of the house, put it together into the shape of a man and it is a recognizable symbol of winter and fun. Maybe you’re just clearing off the snow from the ground, perhaps you are putting up a figure to protect you from enemies, or you could just be looking for a good time. But an inflatable or plastic snow man… is a recognizable symbol of entrepreneurs taking advantage of consumer gullibility. A fake snow man is just sad. The only thing sadder than a fake snowman in a front yard is fake christmas tree in the front yard. Both of those embellishments ignore the real beauty and fun that can be found around us in favor of artificiality for the sake of laziness or grandstanding.

I could concede that lawn ornaments that look like woodland creatures might be acceptable. After all, you could see deer on a lawn, so a fake one just captures that natural beauty and makes it available all the time. It’s much harder to have a real deer stay still in front of your house than to have an immobile tree. But lawn ornaments that look like Santa and his sleigh and his train of reindeer don’t make sense. If you did capture Santa and freeze him on your lawn or roof, would that mean that you’ve killed him? Would it mean that he stopped at your home and couldn’t continue to visit all the other homes? It just doesn’t seem to convey a positive message.

I think it’s understandable that we do actually recognize the natural beauty of winter and thus set out decorations to show our appreciation of such. Therefore, emphasizing the snow and evergreen trees makes sense. Draping lights around trees outside in order to illuminate their shapes makes for an attractive display. Hanging swaths and garlands and wreaths inside your home to bring inside some of the beauty that you recognize from the outdoors also makes sense. Of course it’s sensible if you like the appearance of a crisp evergreen landscape in the winter, that you might want to have some of that same appearance inside your home. For that matter, it’s hard for me to think of a natural phenomenon that is both so common and so pretty as freshly fallen snow, so adding some flocking to your decor is also perfectly reasonable. It would look better to have real snow on your Christmas tree or wreath, but obviously that snow would melt and be impractical.

The decorated tree itself is frankly just an aspect to Christmas that I think is pretty. I find conical evergreens to be the most beautiful of trees all year round, so when I find that they are sold at this time of the year in convenient take-away preparations, I choose to take advantage of that. But the roots of the tree celebration are apocryphal at best, mythological at worst. Whether you choose to recognize the tree as the pre-christian religions may have (as a symbol of the ending of one yearly cycle of life and death and a precursor of the next year to come) or as a physical representation of the Christian trinity in living geometrical shape (as St. Boniface attempted to claim to germanic tribes in the 16th century) as or just a pleasantly scented tradition, it seems like a tradition we can all get behind. The only part of a Christmas tree celebration that I dislike is when an overt attempt is made to have a tree that is obviously neither a real tree nor a reasonable representation of one. I therefore dislike trees that are strangely colored or wholly artificial as if they are made of metal or glass.

As to Christmas tree ornaments…. I can’t say that I can recall ever seeing anything hanging from a Christmas tree that didn’t seem well within the range of what I’d call “decoration”. I imagine if you hung something on a tannenbaum that was so large that it began to tip the tree in one direction or another, I’d call foul to that.

My friends wonder that I am so critical of decorations when I’m trying to pursue the spirit of Christmas. I say to them that no matter how much I like the holiday, I’m not going to accept its occurrence as a blanket pardon for acts of bad taste. Besides, maybe all of the ugly decorations have contributed to people disliking Christmas over the years. If that’s the case, then this diatribe might actually serve the purpose of a public service announcement. In fact, I’ll declare it so: Save Christmas by Decorating Well!