So get this. I’m a Mac fan with a starboard tack towards zealotry; this is generally well known. But for the most part it’s self-contained: though I will never condone Microsoft products, I hold computery things in the same light as religion–that is, whatever works from you, and don’t try to convert me. It will be ill-fated.

Imagine, then, my pleasure when much of my family recently, spontaneously and almost simultaneously decided to make the switch. First was my sister, a 25-year-old saint who is starting her second year at Harvard Law.

Then–and this was a bit more of a protracted vacillating–my mother. I spec’ed and ordered a MacBook for her, worried that it would have trouble successfully supplanting her beloved Toshiba.

There were definitely some moments when she first started using OS X. But, now that the kinks are ironed out (the final one was this morning when she finally got duplex printing working on her HP printer), we have what I believe to be a happy customer.

But the most exciting part is still to come. My 92-year-old grandmother will be getting her MacBook sometime in the next several days (it’s slated to ship today). What makes this the most interesting is that she has vehemently refused any help whatsoever in configuring or learning how to use the thing. She sees the whole thing as an exercise in maintaining mental acuity. She won’t even let us buy her a book.

This to me seems almost the perfect test of “it just works”. Will a 92-year-old with minimal (albeit some) computer experience and absolutely on her own be able to make it go?