Like many people here, I started my programming experience with the good ol' green screen BASIC that you get when you booted an Apple II without a disk. I taught myself C++ in my teens, and even took a class on it in college, but as soon as I discovered .NET and C#, I dropped C++ like a bad habit. Now, (many) years later, I'm interested in getting back into C++ development - thank the iPhone for that - and I have to admit, I feel a little daunted. Having to deal with pointers, ATL, macros, etc. seems a bit overwhelming at times when you've been in managed .NET land for a long time. 

What are some good resources or weekend type projects I could do to ease me back into C++? I'm not interested in debating the relative merits between platforms, stacks, but I would be interested in hearing about *objective* comparisons between different development platforms, although keep in mind I'm a Windows guy.

If anyone wants to change the tags around, feel free - I wasn't quite sure how to tag this.

TIA!