BLAST!! DAMN YOU VILE MACHINE!!

Okay....here is another post that really has nothing to do with the house, but about the infernal machine I build this blog with.

Some time during the night of Monday the 3rd my machine was hacked and my e-mail hijacked. I was lucky that only my addresses/contacts were deleted.

So, for the past three days I have been in a somewhat 'Stewie-esque' mood. For those of you who know me, and might have picked up in other posts, I'm a big Stewie Griffin fan. I think the following pictures help illustrate the mood of the past few days.

Wednesday morning started out like normal until I checked my mail…

My PC was acting up and I was getting all kinds of e-mail from ticked of people and groups.

A huge portion of Wednesday was spent cleaning up the spam mess that MY name was attached to and working with Yahoo to deal with the perp and fix the problem.

Per the people at Yahoo I picked up a worm virus, from another e-mail and that it had infected my system.

The afternoon and early evening was spent trying to hunt down the bug that had invaded my system.














Nothing I did seemed to work....















BLAST!!

DAMN YOU VILE MACHINE!!


It was time to seek outside help.

I got on-line and talked to a few people and they hooked me with some helpful web site.



It was suggested that I check out the "Kim Komando" site and got to her ''Security Douwnload' page. I have been to her page before and paid it a visit.

However, the main piece of info led me to the CastleCopsWiki site and their 'Malware Removal and Prevention' page.

After following the instructions on the MR&P page I then surfed over to their 'Prevent Re-infection' instructions to figure out how to keep the nasties away.

It was also suggested that I cruise over to the McAfee SiteAdvisor site to get their Internet protection plug-in.

Here is what they claim to do:

McAfee SiteAdvisor™ is a security add-on for your Internet Explorer browser that helps you identify sites that are linked to spyware, adware, spam, viruses, browser-based attacks, phishing, or online fraud.

The McAfee SiteAdvisor service is based on a huge database with detailed test results for more than 100,000 pieces of software and covers more than 95% of the world's Web traffic.

The program integrates with search engine results from popular search engines and also adds an icon to the browser toolbar that indicates whether a site is safe to use, or should be used with caution.

If McAfee SiteAdvisor has negative information for a site, you can review a very detailed report that shows any spam received from that site, harmful downloads, and association with other sites.

With all this new info in hand I was ready to wage war against the infections.











After a LOT of time and effort, and TONS of moaning and groaning....

Victory is mine!!

OH YES!!






Now That I have successfully cleaned, purged, and reworked my computer system things seem to be going much faster and working as well as it did the day I got the contraption.

However...I have learned one thing...



Things will be different with this system for now on....

I have a plan and...

Let it be over - just let it be over

How many of you have been saying "let it be over - just let it be over" in regard to the election?

I know I'm sick of it all. There was a line a block long at 6:30 AM here!!! Here - in our tiny town!! And the booths didn't open till 7:00 AM!!

I have refrained - on purpose - from talking politics on this blog. I mean, who really wants to go to a house blog and read about politics?!

However, I just couldn't take it any longer...... I think the picture below illustrates my thoughts and feelings better than I can put into words.

I have this classic Stewie shirt. I wore it to the polls. If I would have given enough forethought I would have gotten an election button for both of them and placed them in the spots the picture shows. I would probably been kicked out but hey...I've been kicked out of better places.

Anywho....why can't we go back to the way it use to be? A much simpler time in politics. A time when you didn't have a teams of president/vice-president running.

Why not go back to the time when the person who got the most votes became president and the runner-up became vice president?

Better yet...maybe we SHOULD put the leading contenders in a ring and let them beat each other (no holds barred) till one is left standing. Imagine the fun we could have with that.

I'll leave you with this....

I voted. Did you?

Till next time....

Cheers!
Larry