... and then spend hours waiting for Windows Update to update ... reboot ... update ... reboot ... while hoping that there isn't some horrible worm that will take over your machine while your waiting to get the critical patch that was published 20 "Patch Tuesdays" after your zip archive.

I did this once (only I sent it via snail mail packet) but then the bank happily sent me the fully filled out application for my signature ... in a pdf ... via email.

I was horrified. My name, my wife's name, our address (past and present), ssn, all my account balances and numbers for every financial thing I own -- every single piece of the most sensitive personal information I have in one convenient package in an unencrypted email.

I sent a very terse message conveying how upset I was that they did this but they literally just said, "We've never had a problem doing it this way."

Needless to say I stopped doing business with that mortgage company.

I think it is sad but without a law I don't see financial institutions changing. Even then just look at how they interpreted the "multi-factor authentication" law ... site key, really?

It felt like the quiz was given by comic book guy fresh out of MCSE school with a sarcastic, spitty, snorting laugh coupled spastic eye-roll after each incorrect answer to an obscure MS buzzword soup test. Ok, fine, I admit it, I only got 35% but I'm not bitter.

Noted physicists Schrödinger and Heisenberg are driving around in a car, and Heisenberg goes "I think we just ran over a cat."

"Is it dead?" asks Schrödinger.

"I can't be certain", says Heisenberg.