29 November 2009 It’s simple, we do it because we can.

Win7 comes with “Windows Live.” Windows Live comes with Live Mail, which I need in order to receive and read the love notes from various Russian and Ukrainian men posing as women and offering me endless physical pleasure if I will only provide them with my credit card so that they may send me samples of ED drugs.


Windows Live also comes with Windows Photo Gallery. Windows Photo gallery will, if allowed, invade my computer’s hard drive and locate every graphic image on said drive. It will then proceed to rearrange my file structure so that all my images are subsequently mis-filed in a file or folder called “My Photos.”

I began using computers before Windows programming became the standard of use. I learned to store files on a hard drive in a hierarchical manner that let me recall and use them in a manner similar to the way my gray drive works. Windows annoys me because it wants to control how I store my files.

You see, I’m actually aware that this computer is mine. I don’t need to have a master document file named “my documents.” I tend to file documents in files related to their purpose. Poetry goes in a poetry file, letters to Congressmen and Senators who do not listen to my concerns are filed in “letters to Congress” Photographs (images for the young) are filed in similar manner. If I want to use a landscape shot from this month I look for it in Photos/creek shots 09/nov 09/ and it will be right where I left it.

In using past Windows editions, I’ve renamed or erased every file that began with “MY” But the last couple iterations of Windows have been coded so that the “My ____” recreates itself if erased.

So I won’t use Windows Photo Gallery or HP Photosmart as they not only want to hijack my files, they want to send them out to be printed and then mailed or e-mailed to good friends who remain good friends because I don’t clutter their lives with images which interest me but most likely not them. I may want a daily image of Cassi Creek but most people I know would quickly tire of such clutter arriving in their e-mail. In fact, I don’t take those photos every day. I look for change and then capture what I see that interests me. And I file it where I will look for it so that I don’t need to let the Windows present me with all the Cassi Creek photos when I know exactly which one I want and when I took it.

Windows Live comes with “Writer.” “Writer”, like Word 2007, promises to allow me to write this blog and publish it directly to BlogSpot. Unfortunately neither program does as promised. I suppose I could scrap this blog and begin a new one, in hopes that either “Writer” or “Word 2007” might actually allow me to write and post without some copy and paste work. But the reward isn’t that great. I’ve been cutting and pasting since “Word Star,” “Word Perfect,” and “Word” were competing for the major share of the word processing business. I really liked Word Perfect. But Word became the standard of use and here I am still cutting and pasting, looking at changing to Open Office instead of fattening the Microsoft coffers for programs that I, as with most users, don’t really need in the packages available for sale.

We bought a new copy of Adobe Photo Elements 8 to use to refine images. We don’t need all the cute, “inspirational” fluff that comes with it. I don’t send out photos surrounded by balloons, flowers, and stuffed animals to anyone. I find inspiration in myself, Gloria, our marriage, and other places, not in “inspirational messages or images; and never, never, never in motivational or inspirational speakers.

If Adobe, or Microsoft want to inspire me, they can construct and sell me a basic photo manipulation program that doesn’t hijack my files, try to send files out to a printer, and doesn’t bombard me with anything “cute.” Then they can stop adding things to basic word processing, data base, and spreadsheet programs that have nothing to do with the actual function of those programs. Instead of spending the years after a program release making it obsolete, spend those years fixing the bugs that were in it when I had to buy it because the program I was using and liked it no longer supported by the company or the current operating software on my computer.

If this sounds too much like an Andy Rooney segment, it is Sunday evening. That means I’ll have to dodge some endless football game while players, coaches, and advertisers stretch a 15 minute quarter to an hour of wasted transmission time.

I wonder what Andy Rooney is doing tonight? I doubt he’s buying ED drugs in order to meet Russian and Ukrainian men posing as women, either.