it's extra frustrating because i had downloaded a working copy previously but i lost it when the machine crashed.

i've been sitting here for hours trying to get this to work.

as mentioned previously, there are reasons why i want to use the microsoft site to convert and not one of these shady free conversion sites, but if the microsoft site refuses to skip the conversion to docx, i don't have a choice but to resort to the shady sites.

docx is simply not an acceptable file format for me.

so, i guess i'll try again when i get through the next phase, but, for now, i need to move on.