Stop giving "create your drawing here" in Word, just let me draw .

[Mark from Lodz]

When I want to draw something in Word, why am I always presented with that
ANNOYING box and "create drawing here" thing? I don't want to draw it there,
thereby ruining the formatting of my page, I simply want to draw the thing
where I choose - perhaps an arrow going from one thing to another, or a box
around a word or something (I'm a teacher y'see). It was possible in Word up
to Office 2000, but in both XP and 2003 I'm given this damned annoying box.
Obviously I can just press Escape, but I can't find a way to just turn this
option off.

 

[Mary Sauer]

Tools, options, general tab, clear "Automatically create drawing canvas when
inserting autoshapes....."

 

[Mark from Lodz]

Thanks a million. This has been bugging me for over a year!