Despite some encouraging progress on the delivery front, a few of the shiny new Macs announced at the Expo continue to be a little tricky to grab. The Cube, in particular, presents a challenge; some viewers report that their local dealers will have them in stock "any day now" and ready to unload on people willing to drop $1799 on the world's first gigaflop tissue box, while others bemoan their order's ever-increasing lead time from the Apple Store. (The current reported estimated ship date for new Cube orders is three weeks.) None of the major online resellers lists them as being in stock. We admit that, despite having seen several Cubes in person a few weeks ago, we were starting to think the whole thing was just an elaborate hoax or a dream sequence or something. But we see no reason to doubt faithful viewer Jesus Diaz when he claims to have written to us from his very own Cube-- in Spain. So they are out there, but you might have to drive a bit farther than you thought to pick one up.

Today, though, new information has surfaced that may help us improve matters drastically. As a MacInTouch reader reports, when he called Apple to check on the status of his late Cube 500, he was told that the computer itself "is in ample stock." Yes, apparently there are scores of 500 MHz Cubes lining Apple's shelves, just waiting to bring their own hexahedral brand of lovin' into the homes and offices of the faithful. So why can't Apple ship them? Get this: "it's the mouse and keyboard that are not ready for delivery." Curses-- hobbled by the Pro Mouse! Which means that if you're currently freaking out because your Cube is late, you can blame Steve Jobs for giving away those four thousand or so transparent little rodents to lucky keynote-attending bastards like us. That's right; Apple's still got your Cube because we've got your mouse.

But before you come over and beat us silly, there are a couple of things we'd like to bring to your attention. First of all, Apple's saying that it'll only be "four to seven days" before they have enough keyboards and mice to ship the first Apple Store orders. If that sounds like a long time, you're not thinking in the Jobsian scheme of things. Secondly, even if you came over and took our mouse, we can't help you on the keyboard front-- Steve was too cheap to give us one of those, too. So you'd still be waiting the same length of time. And lastly, and perhaps most importantly, we think we may have come up with a better way for you to ensure that Apple gets its next batch of input devices done on time.

We were poking around the 'net and stumbled across a Newsweek article about the Cube and its see-through accessories. Reportedly, "entire teams of engineers had to work on its specially molded plastic, going with an optical-grade polymer that would resist scratches and modulate the way light would refract through its surface." Clearly (um, make that "obviously") the hold-up is due to a shortage of this optical-grade polymer; Apple had enough to finish the Cubes themselves, but ran out when it was time to make the keyboards and mice. Now, who's hogging all the polymer? The eyeglass industry, of course. So if you really want to speed up your Cube order, while AtAT certainly can't condone any sort of illegal activity, you might consider some "creative" ways to dissuade customers from patronizing your local LensCrafters...