NOSTALGIA ISN'T WHAT IT USED TO BE

Microsoft is introducing its newest operating system, Windows 7.

I remember when a new OS from Microsoft was a cause for happiness and celebration. Now it just causes fear and loathing.

I'm still using XP Pro. It boots up slowly, programs load slowly, and sometimes it just hangs up and stops. But at least I'm used to it. Most of the time it works, and I don't plan to change.

My favorite OS was DOS 3.2. It booted quickly, applications loaded quickly, and when I installed a program I knew where it went on the hard drive. With Windows, it seems to go everywhere. DOS did everything I needed: pre-Internet bulletin-boarding, arcade games and word processing. It ran the most intuitive word processor ever made, PFS Pro Write, with white letters on a soothing blue screen as God surely intended.

Maybe I'm becoming like one of those old fogeys who wish cars still had carburetors and a regular guy could still fix them in the driveway with a wrench and a spark-gapper.

But I wish I still had that old XT clone of mine.