Snow Leopard and Some Other Stuff

Snow Leopard first, then I shall digress.
I enjoy this new OS, although I had only had this computer for a month before it came out. As stated by several people, blogs, and Apple designers, the main benefits are "under the hood," i.e., load times are faster, etc. The "stacks" (the little icons on the dock that show you everything in them, like "Documents," "Applications," and "Downloads") are different- instead of throwing up a huge menu with all the little icons for programmes and files squashed onto the screen, the stacks have scrolling. Now, you have a limited view of your icons, but they are nice and visible.
I'm not too sure about this feature. I kind of miss the awe-inspiring feeling of seeing all the programmes cluttering up my hard drive in one glance, and it was harder to skip over the desired icon when they were all visible at the same time. I understand why this change was made (so that people with lots of programmes and small screens can see), but can I change it back? I don't have that many programmes...
When I installed the new operating system, I was informed that I needed to back up my computer. This involved going out and buying a hard drive, much to the astonishment of a friend who literally has hard drives laying around at his house. Neither of us will ever cease to be amazed by the number of hard drives in the other's house... A Windows-using family member also bought a hard drive, and made me even happier for my mac. The external hard drive came with a special programme for windows-running computers that syncs with the computer's hard drive and compresses the files, making it possible to view photos and such from the external hard drive... But very, very difficult. They couldn't view thumbnails or navigate from one photo to another without exiting the viewer and clicking a new icon. My external hard drive, however, simply made itself available to Time Machine, which neatly copied the computer's hard drive to a folder in the external hard drive, which I cleverly labeled "Time Machine Backups". The rest of the external hard drive holds things that I don't want cluttering up the hard drive of the computer, such as back-ups of my favourite DVDs. My back-up experience was quick and painless, while my unfortunate family member is still struggling with his over two months later.
So that's Snow Leopard and my experiences with it.
Now I rant about the irony of mac owners.
It's a funny thing, owning a macintosh computer. I am not a computer expert- I click things in a semi-logical progression, then google it if that doesn't work, then contact a more knowledgeable friend if that doesn't help, and then the friend goes through the same procedure. However. I am the owner of a mac who is considered knowledgeable in the fields of sciences and math, therefore I am a computer expert. I assist several fellow mac owners who bought their computers because a) "It's pretty," b) "My boyfriend told me to," and c) "I heard they were the best, but I don't really know how to use them." I entertain serious doubts about the intelligence of these people. Yes, they made a rather good choice (although OS X is not for everyone, just as Microsoft OS's are not for me), but they didn't even read the pretty little booklet that comes with the thing!
I had to show someone how to use exposé. She was using spaces to store all her open applications, and asked me if there was a shortcut... "Yeah. Four-finger swipe on your trackpad." She was entranced by the possibilities, reminding me that not everyone hits all the buttons to see what they do as soon as they get a new computer. If she had, she would have found this mac institution as soon as she hit the F3 key.
So this is something of a tribute to all of you who are kind of forced into this role of "tech support" for your friends and family and acquaintances and friends' friends... Enjoy this comic, then wish that you had the nerve to actually give it to someone.
Cheers,
Anikka