With the Leopard 10.5.2, there is now an option in the Desktop & Screensaver section of System Preferences that allows you to turn off the transculent menu bar that so many people don't like. But many people are not getting this option, even after updating to 10.5.2. If this happens to you, here's what you need to do to get this option to show up for you:

Open a terminal windows (go to Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal Window). Once the window open, type (or paste) in the following text (all on one line) and then hit Enter:

sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.WindowServer 'EnvironmentVariables' -dict 'CI_NO_BACKGROUND_IMAGE' 0

Once you do that, yo can close the terminal window. Next time you open the Desktop & Screensaver section of System Preferences, you should have an option to turn of the transculent menu bar.