When I'm Bored...

When I'm bored I like to read and I also like to write. Sometimes I just start writing (like now) and I'm not sure where the words will take me. I'm not really sure in which direction I will ramble. Since my interests are so diverse and so eclectic I could begin to ramble about anything.

I think I have some sort of a computer virus on my home PC. My Norton Utilities hasn't caught it, nor has my Windows Firewall. Luckily for me, I don't store any sensitive information on my computer, well I do store passwords but since I do not have unlimited access to all of my accounts online these passwords will only allow a very little amount of damage to occur. The reason why I think that I might have a virus, or at the very least a snooping hacker are these: My AOL Instant Messenger is constantly crashing; my computer has been renamed and my computer has crashed 3 times in the last 24 hours, with minimum programs running. Oh and I still get popups from sex sites even though I have CyberSitter installed on my computer.

My AIM has been acting strangely for the last few weeks. I'll be having a conversation and the window will say " is typing" but no words ever get sent to my window. Also when I send messages they will appear with weird blank spaces randomly typed. It is almost as if I am being censored. (This also appears to a lesser extent with my blog entries.) Perhaps I am being filtered by this CyberSitter program?

As everyone that has a machine knows, when one first purchases and boots up a computer a prompt appears in which you have an option to name your computer, most people will choose names like "Home" or "Office." I chose the name "Abulafia" which is from an Umberto Eco novel. This morning I looked at it and now my computer has been renamed "Mysterious." Quite interesting, if you think about it. In order to rename the computer this person had to have incredible and complete administrative access.

Several times during the past 24-36 hours my computer has crashed mysteriously, rebooting from scratch, and each time after the reboot it tells me that "Windows has recovered from a serious error." I'm not sure if it's related but other programs have shut down automatically (with no prompt or command or click) from me. Perhaps this is some hacker showing me that he can remotely turn on and off whatever programs I have running. Perhaps it is some "piggy-backed" software that is riding the "Mysterious" stream of electrons in cyberspace. I wish I knew.

Oh yeah and pop-ups. Goodnight! If I am surfing for a period of more than 5 minutes at a time, I get popups for sexsites (no pictures just a URL and a "File can not be found" icon) and it's quite annoying. It's a big concern of mine because I sweep for spyware and adware on a daily basis. I search the registry, the internet cookies, running processes and programs and everything else I can possibly think of.

I don't know what to do, other than totally disconnect my PC from the cable modem and/or take a shotgun to it. (Which is a problem since I cannot legally discharge a firearm in my county outside of a gunrange.)