My dual monitors display Windows XP for the last time. Amanda Kooser/CNET

I knew this day was coming. The portents were all there. Microsoft swore back in 2011 it would no longer offer support, patches, or fixes for Windows XP come this April. The company snarkily told customers they should move to a "modern operating system." A plague of locusts descended on my home office.

On a cloudy day last week, at 11:43 in the morning, I turned off my Windows XP-loaded Dell for the last time. It made a little whining, sighing noise as it powered down. All my important files were offloaded to an external hard drive and a brand-new custom-made Windows 7 desktop sat nearby, gloating about its ascendance with its shiny black case and complete lack of cat hair sucked into the fan.

I bought my Dell XP desktop so long ago, I can't even figure out what year it went into service. It had a hard drive replaced a few years back, but kept trucking along, rarely crashing. It was never a superstar, but it also never truly failed me. I feared what Windows 7 would bring. I wondered if it would feel like crash-landing on an alien world where I didn't speak the language.

A little background about my computing tendencies. I enjoy dwelling in the Switzerland-like realm of operating-system agnosticism. I use an Android phone, an iOS tablet, a MacBook for a laptop, and Windows for my desktop. I had already decided that Windows 8 would be too much to deal with, considering the glitch history and weirdness of Metro. I chose Windows 7 instead.

I'm glad I did. Instead of feeling like a stranger in a strange operating system, I feel like I'm dating XP's fraternal twin brother. Sure, it looks a little different. There are some behavioral quirks that are unexpected (like fuzzing out my screen sometimes when my mouse wanders down to the bottom of the display), but it's not that much different.

What I like about 7 is that the OS feels zippy (partly due to my shiny new hardware powering it); the search function is so much more capable; and it quickly wakes from sleep, a process that felt interminable on XP. I'm also kind of in love with the translucent Aero interface showing the background behind the windows. I'm a sucker for subtly flashy features.

If Microsoft hadn't forced my hand by dropping security updates for XP after a 12-year life cycle, I might still be listening to that tinkly, synthy startup sound every morning. Now, I'm greeted by the whistly, synthy "hello" of 7.

I'll admit it. The thought of having to adjust to a new interface made my palms a little sweaty. Yes, yes, I can hear it now: "Wow, Amanda, you're such a wimp. It's just an OS upgrade." There's some truth to that. I was totally wimping out on upgrading, but we're all creatures of habit and it's hard to say farewell to something that's been a part of my daily work life for more than a decade.

Mostly, I feared downtime while I fumbled around learning how to use the revamped taskbar and the new "libraries" system for organizing files (as a journalist, I live on deadline; the last thing I want is for my computer to make me late and stress me out). After all my self-inflicted concerns about upgrading to a new OS, however, I find I'm now thoroughly chill about the change.

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Bye XP, hello Windows 7: Yeah, the change made me nervous