But, I spend 8-14 hrs/day sitting in front of my primary computer, so portable apps simply didn't have much appeal for me. I use mirror folder to sync my laptop to my primary desktop, so on the rare occasion I work away from my office, I already have everything I need.

I can certainly see it in a cruising situation where you might check into an internet cafe and rent a computer for an hour. I have a friend who is a teacher's aid studying to be a teacher and he has all his favorite stuff on portable apps and he can plug in to Trillian and talk to me several times / day, each time from a different computer at school where he works or at the computer lab where he studies. It's perfect for him. He's firefox, got all his bookmarks, his email and Trillian (instant messenger client that handles a multitude of different IMs in one gui) so anywhere he plugs in, he feels "at home."