Sometime in April 2006: I need a faster Mac. My iBook G3 shows its age. I decide to get a new MacBook Pro.

July 2006: I’ll wait until the tax-free weekend.

August 2006: I am poised to buy a MacBook Pro with my wife’s educator’s discount during the tax-free weekend. A friend cautions me against it, saying they’re going to release new models at the MacWorld developer’s conference. I dutifully wait. Patience turns out to have no reward at all, as Apple fails to announce any speed bumps on the MacBook front at all. Much muttering and cursing occurs.

14 October 2006: After much thinking, I decide that my laptop doesn’t really leave the house enough for me to have a laptop any longer anyways, and besides, those Core 2 Merom-based MacBook Pros are looking less likely every day, so I decide to save money and get a suitably enormous 20 inch iMac.

24 October 2006: One day before my new iMac arrives, Apple announces the new Core 2 Merom-based MacBook Pros.