If you’ve ever downloaded ad-supported ‘freeware,’ then there’s a very good chance that there is a ‘trojan adware’ program running on your machine- even if you’re no longer running the original program.

“[TSADBOT] is secretly loaded onto your system when you install completely unrelated software (or even if you don’t!), makes clandestine network connections behind the user’s back, persists even after the software it came with has been uninstalled, and is very difficult to remove.”

“Once installed, TSADBOT (like many Adwares) is very difficult to remove. If deleted, the adbot will often forcibly reinstall itself. In addition, it remains on your system, and continues to download advertisements and monitor your viewing habits, even after the associated app has been uninstalled.”

Read more….

I received this email earlier today.

The Aggie Virus
You have just received the “Aggie Virus” As we don’t have any programming experience, this virus works on the honor system. Please delete all the files from your hard drive and manually forward this virus to everyone on your mailing list.

Thanks for your cooperation,
Texas A & M Computer Engineering Dept

(FYI- Aggies are students from Texas A&M University, a school often teased for having dumb, redneck students. Especially by U of Texas students.)

For once, I’ve done a near-perfect job of painting my fingernails - and I can’t stand the color. *sigh*

Oh. My. Goodness.

I just got this email from a friend:

ever have one of those days at work that makes ya just wanna cry, kill someone, or go home and back to sleep. Or preferably all of those

Cool, Star Dudes. “Star Wars” in 5 minutes. The Bad Dudes Strike Back is also out. (Great little Flash flicks by Dude Studios.)

Well, I’ve finally added some new entries to my journal. Yeah, about damn time, I know….

Hey, Kathie, I used hex values to describe that hair color because it was the quickest way I could think of doing so since L’Oreal doesn’t have samples of the colors on their web site.

Oh, and ’cause I’m a big geek.

Currently listening to:

They Might Be Giants - Severe Tire Damage

Why Does the Sun Shine?

(The Sun is a Mass of Incandescent Gas)

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas

A gigantic nuclear furnace.

Where hydrogen is built into helium

At a temperature of millions of degrees.

The sun is hot.

The sun is not

A place where we could live.

But here on earth

There’d be no life.

Without the light it gives.

We need its light.

We need its heat.

The sunlight that we see.

The sunlight comes from

Our own sun’s

Atomic energy.

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas

A gigantic nuclear furnace.

Where hydrogen is built into helium

At a temperature of millions of degrees.

The sun is hot.

The sun is so hot that everything on it is a gas: aluminum, copper, iron, and many others.

The sun is large.

If the sun were hollow, a million earths would fit inside. And yet, it is only a middle-sized star.

The sun is far away.

About 93 million miles away. And that’s why it looks so small.

But even when it’s out of sight, the sun shines night and day.

We need its heat.

We need its light.

The sunlight that we see.

The sunlight comes from

Our own sun’s

Atomic energy.

Scientists have found that the sun is a huge atom smashing machine. The heat and light of the sun are caused by the nuclear reactions between hydrogen, nitrogen, carbon, and helium.

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas

A gigantic nucelar furnace.

Where hydrogen is built into helium

At a temperature of millions of degrees.

Last night Dale and I watched The Green Mile and The Talented Mr. Ripley. Quite a pair of long movies. Mile was actually better than I’d thought it would be, staying more or less true to the (serial) novel.

After it was over, Dale complained, “Why didn’t you tell me it was such a sad movie??” I thought it was a lot better than Ripley, but that movie was also better than I’d anticipated. Rather un-Hollywood. Especially the ending.

I have just inadvertantly put myself into the position of making a fool of myself in front of a fairly large group of people.

I volunteered to give a quick intro to HTML class for some of the Marketing summer interns, a group of maybe 20 people. At someone’s suggestion, I sent the invitation to the ’summer interns’ mail group, which (duh!) is a list of ALL the current interns. And there are over 250 of those.

Within 5 minutes, I’d already gotten more accepts than the capacity of the conference room I’d reserved.

I don’t have the heart to cancel the meeting and resend just to marketing. (Plus, it would be damn embarassing.) So, it looks like I’m just going to have to buck up, reserve another room, and make more copies of my hand outs.

Oh, lordy!

OK, it was annoying enough that AIM crashed on me and wouldn’t let me reconnect. But the fact that the pop up error window’s “More Details” button took me to the frickin’ AOL main web page really chaps my ass!