After Effects

How do you guys use this software? I can't believe some people composite with this package. What a pain. After being spoiled silly with Flame and Shake, I don't see how AE can keep themselves up to par with the other packages! It's just not intuitive enough to pick and go with the flow.

The reason I'm ranting is because I just got a new G5 for my duties, and I've been playing around with AE 5.5 to do some collaborative work for some of my shots (namely, cheesy lens flares). It's such a pain to do simple things. Maybe Motion might give Shake a run for its money, but Apple owns them all, Motion, Shake, and After Effects. Each one is catered to a specific clientele, which is probably the reason why I never used AE in the past. I would rather comp via pen and paper than enter the mess that is AE. Aargh.