Setting up a Linux virtual machine for easy web development on Windows

Being a Windows user can be a real drag when trying to use technologies originally designed for the Unix world.  This hardship is especially prominent in web development.  While I do admire ASP.NET MVC, and enjoy being able to develop in C# as much as possible, my real passion right now is using Python with the Django framework. For simple applications, I often start out using Cygwin, the Django