the better part of me

I actually dual-booted the machine. When I want to (i.e., the one day a year when I do my tax return...), I unplug the modem and boot into Windows XP - I don't let Windows connect to the internet. The rest of the time, it's running Linux.

Dual booting was quite the challenge: I dropped the Mandrake disk in the CD drive, rebooted the machine, had Mandrake's install program say to me, "Hey!! I detected Windows!! Would you like to dual boot?", and had to choose "yes" or "no". Man, I was tempted to say "no".

(Installing a new printer was equally a challenge. "Hey!! You've got a new printer!! Wanna make it the default?" Yes. "Wanna print a test page?" Yes. "Test page OK?" Yes. Finis. No installing drivers as I had to do in Windows. No rebooting. Just good to go.)