MacMini build -- Introduction

I have an old MacMini, running OS 10.6.4 (aka Snow Leopard). Instead of getting rid of it, I thought I'd take up the challenge of squeezing some extra life out of it as a headless box.

I plugged it in next to my cable modem and voila: a unix-like box for fun and enjoyment. Or not. 

While I've pretty familiar with Linux, OS X is certainly NOT linux. Package management is different, commands are different, it's not wrong or bad, I just don't know how to do it. So maybe figuring that out is fun, maybe?

Step one: Let's confirm that version of the operating system: 

Step two: change the hostname to something more reasonable. Not 100% why all of these are necessary, but it did the trick.

Step three: Let's install a package manager, like HomeBrew. That looks simple enough.

Well, that sucks. Curl doesn't like me. But there has to be a way, right?