the Dalaverse

Today is dead to me, and the rest of the week is on notice.

I was in such a good place right up until 9:45 last night, I really was. I had a very nice birthday weekend, then yesterday I had yet another eye doctor appointment in which I do not have glaucoma, and after that I went to my old boss/my mom's boss's fancy house in North Potomac with the theater in the basement because I'm dog/house-sitting while they're on vacation.

Then I came home, tried to download something, and Megaupload gave me a virus.

I assume it was MU, since it happened right after I clicked on the link; however, I'm suspicious of this new skins (that's not what they're calling it, but I forget what it actually is) thing Firefox is running: I picked one out a couple days ago, but now whenever Firefox gets closed and reopened it pops up with "Thanks for trying this doohickey!" but the skin itself is gone, and it's just being wonky in general. I dunno.

Anyway, the virus is one of those Trojans that mimics an anti-virus tool and keeps trying to link you to a website to buy it - Total Vista Security, to be exact. I googled it and found a set of removal instructions, and ending the process in the Task Manager seemed to make it go away (though its name didn't correspond exactly with what was in the info), but when I opened Artoo this morning it had come back. Even though I ran an AVG scan, FUCK YOU TOO AVG. So I should probably try the rest of the instructions - deleting some registry files and whatnot - but I don't have time before work, and I have very little faith in my ability to not delete important shit by mistake. So I'm gonna pick up a thumb drive on my way home to back some stuff up (fortunately there's not a lot of vital stuff on this laptop since it's only a little over a year old and I can always upload fic data to LJ under lock, but I'd like to copy the pictures from Michael's wedding at least). And then possibly call Quinn's dad for his computer know-how.

But until then, I shall remain at maximum grump setting.

Oh, and I didn't even tell you about my freaky-ass dreams! So between getting the virus and getting the joy of rediscovering it this morning, I woke up sometime between 4:30 and 5 am (it was a bit of tossing and turning before I actually checked the clock). For no apparent reason. And then I couldn't fall back asleep, also for no apparent reason. I sat up and read for awhile, then tried to go back to sleep - except it was around 6 and the day was starting, so it was all noisy outside, and the people who live above us woke up and started walking around over my closet, and in general it was a hell of a task to actually fall asleep.

Then when I did, I had fucked up dreams. First I dreamed that my cat Snake didn't actually die - my uncle John stole him and my parents just told me he was dead. So that was fun, if nothing original. After that I dreamed that I was at a house somewhere and there was a demon invasion coming. I'd blame excessive creepy reading, except it was actually probably due more to watching "Practical Magic" a couple of weeks ago because it was kind of like the exorcism at the end: there were a ton of people milling about for some reason. And a lot of them weren't taking it seriously, walking through protective circles and opening windows and shit, and I kept yelling that they had to believe in stuff or we wouldn't be safe (except Quinn, who was sprinkling salt and saying incantations that were all made up of numbers, and my coworker Pam who for some reason was a supernatural BAMF in this reality). Then as the demons were attacking, I realized that someone had let one in - this Iggy Pop-looking fuck with long stringy hair - so I grabbed him and tried to slit his throat, but it was like I couldn't find the vein or he didn't have any blood. I was just trying to get someone to help me when I woke up, all disoriented and freaked out.

I repeat: Fuck. Tuesday.