Viruses

Last week's technical debacle pretty much fried my nerve ends that had not already previously dis-attached since the bridge going out incident. After my last blog post of 4/20, I was more than ready to settle in for a quiet Easter weekend. Alas, such was not to be the case...

Unfortunately, Dear Child had caught a bug from someone someplace in our township and came down with what will forever be called "that first stomach bug."

Who knew (other than more experienced parents) that a child could throw up once, not eat for three days and then poop enough for five well-fed adults? One simply does not intuit that from childfree life. Nor does one know that one can become best friends with a pediatrician who LOVES to hear your anxious voice at 3:30 am night after night after night...

One learns so many things during a child's "first stomach bug."

I did not know that the banana, rice, apples & toast (BRAT) diet excludes apple juice. It seems that the juice form of the fruit has the opposite effect on human stomachs (natch).

I did not know that Pedialyte comes in yummy flavors and can be made into groovy ice cubes.

So much learning, so little time...but thank God the bug was programmed to run its course in approximately 36 hours, which meant that Dear Child was better for Easter. My nerves sang in jubilation and were ready to catch up and get ahead on a number of projects big and small, when....

My computer came down with its own virus someplace from someone, which will always be known as the "Vista Security 2011 Fiasco." At first, being technically naive, I believed that I need to buy Vista Security to stop getting pop-ups warning me of breaches in my McAfee Firewall.

After days of ignoring, then searching the desktop, then trying to buy the program, I realized as I was reading the terms of purchase that there were typos in the online document. Now, typos we see everywhere, even in this blog, but this was supposedly a Microsoft agreement. There is no way in this universe that Microsoft would ever, and I repeat ever, have a typo in one of their contracts. They're about as anal as I am about contracts. And there are more Microsoft lawyers looking at the same documents before they go live.

So I knew something was afoot.

Upon a quick Google search, I had what I needed: numerous website giving me instructions on how to wipe the virus from my computer. Yet none of them worked.

Finally, I called McAfee and paid the $90 to have them take over my computer and clean it for me. That $90 was money extremely well spent.

Dear Child and computer are both healthy again. My exergaming workouts continue. Weight loss carries on. And now, ten days later, I'm able to catch up and get ahead on projects that are stockpiled. God willing, we'll be free of other such viruses and seriously horrible impediments for quite some time.