I too tried to love Things, but just couldn't get into it. The to-list needs to be simple enough to use without thinking, yet powerful enough to offer a specific set of features.
With the release of Mountain Lion I am getting along fine with Reminders. I use Fantastical in my menu bar to add things, it's always synced to my phone. Has priority, time & date, and geolocation.
Ah hah, I forgot about Fantastical. Looks like it will do the trick for quick entry of reminders which was one of the few features I was missing after Things. (Plus there's a 50%-off sale).
Using an Fn double-tap to dictate makes it Siri-esque, only more reliable :)
It was the wait for over-the-air syncing, with months of overwrought blog posts, that led me to abandon Things. I recreated my use in the Reminders app and have been much happier since. With this 2.0 I see they have finally, years later, released "cloud syncing".
I don't see $50 worth of functionality, but still, wish them well with the new release.