What's wrong with $HOME in the non-cygwin case?

I'd probably write:

```
userhome="$HOME"
if is_cygwin; then
  # cygwin sets home to something f-d up, set to real windows homedir
  userhome="$USERPROFILE"
fi
```

Then just refer to it as $userhome with no funky need for subshells and echoes.