Mac transition: a 'reailty' check

Its been over a month since my transition to Mac, and I had set myself a review touchpoint at around this time to reflect on the migration, and had perhaps hoped to feel good about the smooth transition and cool productivity hacks learnt. Unfortunately, its not been a happy ending, atleast not just yet! I continue to struggle with the new machine and the transition is far from complete. 

Here is an update on what has worked and where I need urgent attention. Firstly the good:

• Hardware: I'm thoroughly enjoying all aspects of the hardware performance, whether its the gorgeous display that makes almost anything look great, or the blazing-fast performance with the i7 processor, 16 GB RAM and SSD HD. The machine is truly mobile, with a battery life of 4 to 5 hours (perhaps it might last the supposed 8 hours, with energy saver on)
• Apps compatibility: The machine has worked fine with most apps I use and I haven't had any platform specific issues, apart from an instance where it was unable to write back to my External HD that was setup on Windows.
• Settling down with Safari: There is some new-found familiarity with Safari, and its a good thing since 90% of my time is spent on the browser. Features like pinned tabs, easier navigation and some shortcuts at browser & gmail level have made life easier.

.. and the niggles:

• Mac Office: Powerpoint, Word & Excel would rank amongst my top used applications of all-time & I used to have a reasonably efficient way of getting stuff done. I'm at a loss of words on the extent to which I'm struggling on this now. Perhaps its got to do with the version (MS Office for Mac 2011 v14.4) which feels like a poorly built office with badly designed shortcuts, and I really hope an upgrade will sort this out.
• Managing files: Yes, I did manage to find my Hard Disk eventually! But I still suck at accessing and moving files through the 'Finder'.
• Mac native features & apps: I'm yet to figure out efficient ways of working with in-built apps like iTunes, iBooks, Pages, nor have I explored any new useful Appstore application. There is scope to improve on usage of cool features like the multi-touch gestures, or even try out basic customisations & system preferences. 
• Shortcuts & efficient ways of working: Inspite of the early ground covered, I've lagged in learning shortcuts across applications, for instance I still don't know how to 'lock' or 'put to sleep' with keystrokes. 

I'm working on these, and hope to publish a 'happy-ending' to this migration story sometime soon.