Masochist?

So for the past month I've done a lot of "fiddling" with Linux on my laptop, PC, and PS3. I've always been a nerdy guy when it comes to computers, it's always been a hobby of mine, but I never thought I'd become one of "those" guys. The kind of guy who uses Linux instead of Windows. While I don't think that is who I have become, I have certainly gone down that path further than I ever have before. I've gotten Ubuntu up and running on my laptop and PC right now, both working perfectly. I installed it on my laptop about 2 months ago, and it was very simple and didn't require any extra effort on my part, and was much faster than a Windows install. I use it off and on, but it's really more like an extension of Windows for me. Then, two nights ago I went ahead and installed Ubuntu on my desktop, which was sad to say not as easy of a task as my laptop. ( I know this is really exciting stuff, but welcome to my blog) I must have spent 5 hours just fucking with settings, googling, bugging James/Erik for help, till everything was running as it should (as my laptop did from the beginning). After hours and hours of tweaking, I even got Steam and WoW installed, and running. WoW runs perfect, if not better than it does in my Vista setup, which was really surprising. Steam on the other hand works, but some further googling will have to occur before I can make it playable, it's just too slow.

Anyways, my point in all of this is this - why the hell do I put myself through all of the trouble to get Linux working (as well as Windows) does? I understand that Linux is free, and is not bound down by "the man", and is open source, etc, etc. I get that. But Vista/XP work, they work well, damn well. They do everything I need, and lets be honest, they do it better than Linux. I'm not bashing on Linux, but, if I want to upload a new album to my iPod I'm probably going to have to Google and spend 3 hours trying to emulate iTunes to get it working on my Ubuntu set up. The same with lots of programs. I'm sure that there is a work around for most of these issues, or alternative programs that work just as well if not better.....but it's such a hassle. Yet I enjoy it, I find it entertaining, fun, informative, etc.

But why do I put myself through all of this trouble when I already have an OS that works right now, fully? It's not like I had to pay the big bucks for Vista, or XP, I pirated them obviously. I have no real reason to use Linux, which causes me many hours of troubleshooting, etc, yet I still do it. I'm a Ubuntu cutter, and it feels sooo good! (this is my masochist tie in here lolz)

puh.