I almost never use the numeric keypad. Certainly not enough to justify taking up another third of my desk space. And I hate the way that my keyboard is either not centered under my monitor so that the alphabet will be, taking up mouse room, or that I'm sitting over to the left side of the monitor or have my body at odd angles to type.

On Unix machines, the function keys are useless, or nearly so. Probably moreso than on Macs. And the control key is used extensively. It's much easier to chord with a key just to the left of the `A' key than one all the way at the lower left, unless you've got Roger Staubach hands (obscure reference for this week).