Image resizing questions

I just bought a Canon S230 and have been playing around with different resolutions, resizing etc. I have a few questions:

1.) I am using the highest resolution possible when taking pictures so when I save a photo to my hard drive it is about 1.3 Meg in size. Is there a way to decrease the size of the file without affecting the resolution? I would like to save some space, but still be able to print a large photo (8 X 10 or larger) using the original resolution.

2.) If I want to burn photos to a VCD to watch on my TV, do they have to be resized to show up properly. I have Nero and have heard that it will automatically resize as it burns to VCD, but haven't had a chance to try it yet. If they have to be resized manually, what is the correct size (768 X 512) ??

3.) In what situations would you want to manually resize your photos on your hard drive? I played around with Infranviewer and resized a couple of my photos but when I looked at them they were all distorted and out of focus. Is there a better way to do this, or should I just be leaving all photos as originally captured by the camera?

Thanks for any suggestions.

you should almost NEVER resize your pictures for saving them. After all why would you want to lose information?

You should only resize when forced to, for example when you want them to be displayed on the web..

Never resize any pictures. Burn them to free space on your computer (without resizing). No need to do it if you what to watch them on your TV. Only resize some of them if you want to send them via e-mail, but leave original copy untouched.
Why to spoil quality pictures which did your camera and you paid for this camera?