Well, my beloved machine is back at last. For the most part, anyway.

First, the good news:

• They’ve practically rebuilt the thing. Entirely new screen and top lid, new trackpad, new bottom lid, new speakers, and a new hard drive (and since they couldn’t get another 30Gb one, they gave me a 40Gb instead).
• It’s very clean and shiny.
• It’s still covered in those clear plastic strips they use to keep it clean. Think I’ll just leave them on.
• The annoying big scratch on the top lid is now, of course, only a memory.
• None of this cost me a penny. Got it all on my AppleCare, which expired 5 days after I called Apple to book the machine in for repair.
• After using Fiona’s 12” iBook for almost a month, the 17” 15” screen seems massive.
• It’s goddamn BACK.

And now, the bad news:

• Despite my having been assured to the contrary, they didn’t do any data recovery or transfer. Ergo, Welcome to Mac OS 9.2, and no data. Thankfully, I did a basic backup of my home folder and a couple of other odds and ends before sending it away.
• Scotsys are contacting Apple to see if there’s any chance of getting my old drive back so the data can be transferred, but they don’t hold out much hope.
• My AppleCare has now officially expired, and you can’t renew. So that’s it.

All in all, not too bad, though it was away for <em>far</em> too long. Now begins the 
long system-rebuilding process, so bear with me for a little bit longer. Praise be that 
I remembered to backup ~/Library/!