I have two copies of WinXP Media Center 2005 Edition. That's not that old, but in order to get it to update properly (after installation) I had to manually install SP3. Then it installed 117 service patches, restarted and installed two more.
Freakin' ridiculous.
2005, that's ancient. That's nearly 8 years ago. 117+ patches for 8 years, that's not really a large number at all.
Let's say 120 patches, divide that by 8 that's 15 patches a year.
If you really have an aversion with Microsoft releasing and supporting patches for an 8+ year old OS then you can slipstream the updates into a custom XP.
Google nlite some good resources there.
As for Windows 8 being the next ME that's just insanity. ME was junk, blue screens and crashing etc. Windows 8 is stable, quicker than my Windows 7 install and the new start screen is step in the right direction.
Times are changing. The start menu has been around for along time. There will be the usual complaints and arguments just like when Windows 95 hit the scene but after a year or so it will calm down.
