What Does MINE Say? Suite!

Most corporations these days are forever entangled with the one-stop document management package that is Microsoft Office. I can’t speak as to whether or not it is the best office suite on the market today, mainly because I have no basis of comparison. As long as I can remember, it has been the dream team of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, and Outlook that has been running my professional life, whether I like it or not.

We pause a moment to pay our respects to Microsoft FrontPage, an early web publishing tool that was pre-loaded on Mookie and on which I tried to develop and administer my first-ever Fantasy Hockey League. Those were the days when I made the league GM’s pick up free agents by filling out actual paper work. Needless to say, they were plenty of shiny objects in my peripheral vision that grinded this e-project to a screeching halt. Hey, I was 17. Sorry guys. Let’s go ride our bikes!

I like Microsoft Word. 98% of the blogging that occurs on YAB has its initial draft typed up in Microsoft Word. It allows me to keep a much closer eye on column length, word count, and spelling and grammatical errors. And most of the time, it succeeds in that job. You know where Microsoft Word chooses to fail me, however? Homophones. Why couldn’t the wizards behind grammar check write in some code that would prevent the most obvious of homophonic errors from happening? We here that it will be hear in future versions.

I like Microsoft Excel. But then again, I kind of have to. When you devote your career to the inner workings of financial number crunching and other miscellaneous calculations, it’s a love or die proposition. It’s an organized way to make math do the work for you, and it has so many lines meeting a right angles that even Nordberg can appreciate the simplicity of the design. Of course, I’ve never tried to pen a blog post in Excel, nor have I found a way to incorporate everything I learned in AP Calculus within the program’s confines, but it does serve as the Oscar Party Standings Engine, does it not? Shockingly, no derivatives or binomials make appearances in that fine workbook, either.

I like Power Point. There’s nothing like the fast moving combination of professional headers and overstated bullet points to make something appear organized, yet user-friendly. However, a successful Power Point presentation must thrive on content, not bells and whistles. For example, in grad school I once attended a marketing course where the professor opted to use a Power Point to outline a chapter. As part of her knowledge, her slide said that “Local Print Media and Word of Mouth are Major Tools in Forming a Grassroots Campaign.” Why she chose to capitalize everything is beyond me. However, the phrase “Major Tools” stayed with me long after class was dismissed. It just sounded official. Since then I’ve been sending Christmas cards to my state’s senator from Retired Major Edolphus K. Tools, in hopes that Jon Rogers will open said card on behalf of the Senator, and immediately fall out of his office chair.

I’m completely indifferent about Access. Databases are something I’d pay someone to design for me. Other than the once I made to organize our wedding guest list, they’ve all been failures. If I only had a friend who loves to collect DVDs, create microbews, and design databases. That would solve all my problems.

I hate Outlook.

It just told me I’m going to be in training for the next five hours.