And then Apple made everything worse -- debuting five new iMac colors at Macworld, all in my favorite catalog shades: Indigo! Ruby! Sage! Graphite! And, of course, Snow. Now the puzzling would begin again. Might the Ruby iMac clash with the Garnet walls? Was the Sage iMac the same shade of Sage as my hand towels? I wondered: Would Apple ever consider launching a line of desk furniture in the same stunning shade of Indigo, perhaps with contrasting accents in a lovely Sky or Ocean?

Who could have predicted computer hues named after my favorite kitchen spices!

But all those thoughts faded away when I spied the new G4 Cube on the Apple Store Web site. There it was, an enticing eight-inch cube, hanging effortlessly in a crystal-clear enclosure. Apple had outdone itself again, reinventing the notion of what a desktop computer should be: Not a heavy lunk of metal and plastic, but tiny and lighter than air, an object worthy of your mantle. Practically floating. A miracle.

I was astonished, and aghast. Damn those designers: I'd have to remodel now, and install some crystal-clear walls to go with my new computer. I envisioned a house made of glass, perfectly square, with my Cube at the center. Or maybe I'd buy ten of them, and use them as a coffee table...