You went to the same high school I go to. Just so you know I'm some crazed out sex-depraved stalker.
I don't remember an old editor for lj. Perhaps you mean the basic HTML editor, which is the one I prefer using. That's easy to get to. Just hit HTML next to Rich Text. But I agree. The only time I use Rich Text is if I'm making a table, because it's so much easier with the editor than it is with HTML. In fact, I don't even know how to do one using HTML.