After opening Carrara and selecting file-new, then when going to Insert - the arrow turns into a hand. From then on I'm unable to select any options, the select arrow remains a hand. What gives?

Thats very odd. Are you clicking any keyboard keys accidentally?

there are 3 icons in lower left: magnifier, camera, hand. were any selected?

Neither of these is the issue, I did try the hand in the lower left and back to select and still the same little hand. At the present time I am not used to using key board strokes, so no to bwtr.
I'll keep trying.
Thank you for your prompt response.
Michael

Have you changed your preferences to "hot keys are sticky". That will keep the same tool selected. So, since the space bar is the shortcut for the hand tool, that might be it.

That happens on my system once in awhile - I have to restart to fix it, but luckily it's very infrequent (knocking on wood now) ....

yep, me too. restart c6pro to get rid of it. but in my case, altho the hand icon sticks, I can still select menu items.