I've caved (even more) to the Google Machine

I've been resistant to fully embracing the Google mentality that everything is better in web app form. I like having separate applications for email, instant messaging, and news feed reading, mostly because I can hide them without closing the application (and I don't like or think to minimize things on my Mac) and because I can get notifications, either through dock badges or Growl.

But lately I've been finding myself using Gmail in web app form more and more, mostly because tagging just doesn't work as well anywhere else.

And NetNewsWire now syncs with Google Reader, so I'm back to using that, so I've been sitting with Firefox open with three tabs (2 Gmail and 1 Google Reader) pretty much all the time lately.

I don't really like this. I'd much rather have everything in the background, and get Growl notifications when there are updates. I also don't really like Firefox that much anymore.... Maybe when Chrome for Mac gets finished (I have the beta but have yet to fully switch to it) I'll get even more on board the Google Train.