Go MoGo Go!

So it seems fitting as its 40th birthday has just passed, that I've been playing with this ingenious little gadget for the last couple of days and have to admit: it is ingenious and it is little. However like so many profligates in these suddenly straitened times I found myself asking, "why lord, why?" ("Just because" no longer seems to be a satisfactory response.) So what follows is a post-hoc rationalisation, the economic collapse between its order and its delivery having taken everyone by surprise --- including all economists, masters themselves of explanation after the fact.

Setting it up was a breeze, even after a couple in the pub and on a laptop running Linux (although it was the very latest version of Ubuntu). The manufacturers must have been quite confident on this score, especially of punters' ability to deal with Bluetooth, because all the (short, illustrated) manual says is (paraphrased) "use your laptop's bluetooth manager to pair with it." However it worked first time for me so no complaints on this score.

(In the interest of full disclosure I do have a bit of experience with the wireless-connection-protocol-from-hell^H^H^H^HSweden but if you're a child with Bluetooth experience, or indeed a slightly inebriated engineer, you'll have no problem. Probably.)

The advantages over this laptop's former mouse (a wired, optical and equally small but not so sleeket beastie) are exactly two --- or exactly three, depending):

1. It doesn't seem to care about the surface you use it on; the older one required a mat (a dinner mat as it happens).
   
2. I can now actually use my laptop on my lap with the mouse on a table nearby without that tiresome cable business.
3. (Maybe.) If you had a really snug carrying case, and an aesthetic dislike of unsightly bulges caused by an external mouse, the drug-mule characteristics of this one would appeal to you. (Of course this is an elegant solution to the recharging problem as well but hey with a cable you wouldn't have that.)
   

On the downside I miss a scroll wheel: I seem to be able to scroll down but not up again, at least without making an exaggerated gesture. Perhaps this is just me, or the Linux device-driver. Also it's hard to hit the middle button without engaging the scrolling action, which is annoying.

Finally what's with the manual? In parts the language is really hokey: "Sync [...] with your laptop so you can go, man, go!" and "... that means you're ready to MoGo." (French people will be relieved to learn that these solecisms haven't made it past the language barrier; I imagine a French translator just saying "non.")