Not being a glutton for punishment, I soon switched to a US keyboard layout, either on a real US keyboard (Macbook or Unicomp) or a German one (old Thinkpad, Model M). The latter gets a bit iffy with a few keys due to the different "enter" key size, but you get used to it.
I used to switch to a German layout for typing German text (umlauts etc.), but lately I've just been using the alternate text entry systems. If only they were the same on Macs and Linux systems (Compose vs. tertiary)…
I also consider to switch the y and z keys like in the us layout, because i need the y key way more often (copy selection in vim) and find it very uncomfortable to reach.