While I was in college, a friend coaxed me into drawing something for the wall above her bed. She had the specific dimensions in mind, having already purchased a frame that suited the sensibilities of her college student chic motif. She defined the medium (pen and ink) and chose the subject -- but allowed me the hallowed artistic license with regard to concept and composition.

I'd just painted the Queensryche's OPERATION: MINDCRIME logo on the back of a denim jacket (high-vogue, I know) for a buddy and was a little reticent to be on the hook again for someone else's artistic whimsy. But, hey, I was in college, too. A bag of potatoes and peanut butter sandwiches lose their tummy-tempting allure after so many weeks. And I figured some cash in the pocket could translate to food in the fridge.

So, after a brief period of hesitation, I set about the task. Soon after I began the piece, she left school, and I never heard from her again. I remained unpaid, so the piece consequently remained unresolved. Spurred by the tides of the 24-hour news cycle I recently unearthed the drawing, nearly two decades after I began it.





It wasn't like the man had not made music (and music videos) that peppered the years of my life. At the time, he had not descended into the tabloid fodder, courtroom circus, and plastic surgery mishap that now defines him to younger people. And by younger, I mean those who did not live through the infectiousness of Off the Wall, the omnipotence of Thriller, the tour de force of Bad.

"He was a dynamo," I tell these kids. "Hit after hit. He influenced what people wore and how they danced."

"He's a freak," they rejoin. A familiar chorus from those who know him only from the days he was topping Internet headlines and not Billboard charts.

He was a powerhouse of pop hits, a cultural event, a consummate showman, and the Fred Astaire of Motown. Even if you can't stand him, the facts (e.g., charts and sales) speak for themselves. Of course, all of that has since been tainted by allegations of pedophilia and the public transmutation to a racially vague androgyne. He was a monster to some, a deity to others, and a bank to many.

The exuberant and playful vocals of his Off The Wall tracks gave way to the visceral catcalls, verbal ticks, and syncopated grunts that marked the era of his affected sour-faced macho posturing, as if to plead: "I'm so vulgar that you have to be convinced of my manliness."

Thus, he was King of Pop and King of Paradox. It seemed as though he wanted to physically become Diana Ross -- maybe her alter ego, Dirty Diana. Later, he verged on a black-wigged Carol Channing or drug-addled, Glaaaadiatorrr-spewing Elizabeth Taylor. His famous Peter Pan Syndrome became less first-star-to-the-right-and-straight-on-'til-morning and more a darker fantasy of wealth and self-loathing.

In the end, for me, it seems healthiest to brush all those perceptions aside. Perhaps his greatest transformation was not his surgically altered physical appearance, or the frequent video theme of Michael-becomes-panther/Michael-becomes-giant-robot/Michael-becomes-werewolf/Michael-becomes-sand/Michael-becomes-theme-park/Michael-becomes-sexual-entity sequence. Perhaps his greatest transformation was via his influence on music and its byproduct, music videos...and possibly the single, sequined glove industry.

I have a cairn on my office desk. It is of my own making.

I scavenged the trio of rocks from Goleta Beach Park just north of Santa Barbara several years ago when a good buddy and I were dispatched to the west coast under the delightfully narrow scope of responsibility as editors. Typically, that would have been merely one role we'd play, as we wrapped our arms around the unwieldy beast of a proposal for a government agency. (My previous jaunt to that facility was marked by an average of 118-hours per work week.) But, we were merely hired guns, so to speak, who had the particular credentials to help edit a series of documents whose delivery date rapidly approached.

Therefore, we had more free time than usual. So, I took him to some of the places that I'd previously visited -- Goleta Beach Park among them. I picked up three surf-smoothed rocks that were partially submerged in the beach sand. And now they are stacked on my desk with such perfect appearance that a viewer might consider the result to be a fabrication, a novelty store sculpture.

Each stone's slight variation of hue divided by interstitial shadows. A tiny tower. An ellipsoidal, stone snowman. A mysterious monument.

I'm certain it has a grander meaning. I'm certain.

In 2003, I spent part of the summer working at a facility near the airport in San Antonio. As was typical, my involvement in the project came about when things sank behind schedule and seemed in jeopardy of being pulled together at all. So, I was working long hours and weekends.

I recall knocking off early one night for some mental recess. I drove down to the Alamo Quarry Market to grab a bite at the Canyon Café and see a movie: 28 Days Later.

I totally loved the idea that zombies might be frenetic and haul their undead heinies at you with terrorizing single-mindedness. It was like saying "forget that moaning, shuffling business you've seen in movies, this is what real zombies are like."

There are a couple of zombie flicks in this summer's cinema offerings that look as though they might offer some ghoulish fun: Pontypool (adapted from the Tony Burgess novel, Pontypool Changes Everything) and Dead Snow (or Død Snø). These are imports from Canada and Norway, respectively. And Dead Snow promises the delicious double-dip of evil delivered by Nazi zombies.

I don't tend to think of myself as having OCD. Perhaps OCO is more accurate. It seems more of an order than a disorder. And it manifests itself in a very specific manner.

When I park my car and walk away, I can't dislodge the notion that I really didn't lock it. Can I remember hearing the honk of the automatic lock that will tell me I pressed the right button on the fob? Am I'm sure it locked? Did I accidentally press the UNLOCK button afterwards?

My uncertainty is irritating. So, I have to walk back and hear the car lock one more time.

The accident happened on the last evening of my last year at summer camp.

The camps I attended in the summers of my youth were merely week-long getaways, though I've always had the impression -- from movies and television -- that it is typical in some regions of the country for kids to pack off for a summer-long camp, filling the gap between school years.

I always did well with the crafts, and, with some apprehension, navigated the delicate social constructs of camp-society.

On the last evening of camp, we all went out on a hayride to a farm, where we'd have watermelon and (I don't recall specifically, but I'm guessing here) sing around the camp fire.

While frolicking at the farm, some of us spied a hay ring tipped up on its end like a spinning hamster track. So, I hopped on it and started walking up one side to roll it as though I were in 2001: A Space Odyssey or, in more current context, a Cirque de Soleil act.

Those nearby thought I had a keen idea and piled onto the hay ring with me. With several people rocking the ring in competing directions, I lost my balance and planted my hand on a jagged piece of the ring's metal structure.

It didn't hurt real bad, but it hurt. And when I got off the ring and held my hand up, it was rapidly filling with a pool of blood, like a dark wine seeping from my skin. That freaked me out a bit, but it also seemed oddly incongruous, because it looked really bad, but it didn't feel really bad.

I trotted over to a counselor, who seemed more panicked that I was. She rounded up some other counselors, and soon I was being whisked away to a hospital in the nearest town. First, we had to go back by the camp to retrieve my file with its medical information like the date of my last tetanus shot and a signed note from my parents that the counselors could seek medical attention on my behalf.

I got 12 stitches and a souvenir scar across the meaty part of my palm.

The whole ordeal took a long time. When I returned to camp, the other campers had completed their hayride/farm visit and were already in the big meeting hall for a dance on our last evening at camp.

When I walked in, lots of kids came over to talk to me and ask about what had happened. It felt nice to believe that they were genuinely interested or concerned, though it also seems likely many of them just wanted to get the lowdown on what happened, whether or not that had any interest in my well being.

Dad picked me up the next morning. "What happened to your hand?"

"I got cut. And I had to have some stitches, but it's okay."

Somehow, I felt adult-like by being able to explain something happened, but there was no real cause for worrying -- everything was going to be alright.

I can recall from my youth (which exists now only in my fading memory and the annals of history) watching the earlier incarnations of what has become Texas Country Reporter, a human-interest news show that explores the backroads and backstories of fascinating people around the state of Texas.

There was the guy who built his home from a decommissioned missile silo in West Texas, the old barber in East Texas who's been clipping hair for decades and decades, the tasty eatery in Beaumont, the centenarian porter at a regional airport who still makes his way to work everyday and helps people with their luggage. Stuff like that.

The host, Bob Phillips, is personable -- and, for me, his distinctive voice (sounding like it is perpetually trapped mid-gulp) and inflections have become synonymous with these sorts of down-home segments.

This weekend, I caught part of an episode that profiled John Wells, a former fashion photographer from New York who has staked out a life for himself near Study Butte, Texas, just outside Big Bend National Park amidst the austere West Texas landscape, sometimes desolate, sometimes starkly beautiful, sometimes both.

There are those who can't fathom forsaking their shopping malls, conference rooms, office buildings, department stores, mega-multi-movie-plexes, and other so-called accoutrements of civilization. But, Wells instills a purposeful drive to reconnect with nature and the purity of a self-sustaining life.

It would seem, looking from the outside, that such an existence highlights both the boon and bane of solitude, occasionally conjuring its darker cousin, loneliness. But, some people are better suited for limited opportunities of face-to-face interaction. And Wells manages the tether of DSL to remain connected via the Internet.

He still exercises his photography skills, too, keeping his daily blog lively and documenting life around The Field Lab.

My TiVo kindly picked up the South Park episode about the Pinewood Derby. I was thoroughly amused.

Plus, it took me back to my own Pinewood Derby days. I distinctly remember the unspoken notion that it was really a contest between the dads. And I very much disliked that idea.

In fact, I didn't turn to my dad for any help at all. But, I think part of that was because I didn't want him to get invested in it and then have a poor showing. In some way, I think I was trying to preserve my dad’s invincibility by not letting him compete using me as his proxy.

But, I had no experience carving. And no real tools. Fortunately, I was an artistic tot. So, I simply painted the block of wood like a pack of Wrigley's Doublemint Gum. That way, I wouldn't have to carve at all. And I couldn't be lured into "my car is cooler than yours" battles, because my car wasn't really a car at all.

The ancillary perk was that my design got me off the hook in a marvelously aloof manner. If my "car" lost, I could play it off: "Of course, it did. It's just a block of wood, silly."

It was probably the most talked-about entry that day. And, it wasn't last place in its heat, either.

There's a somewhat new, upscale-ish, fancy-dan development called The Harbor along the shore of the lake near my office. It has a nice Cinemark movie theater and offers a variety of shops and dining options.

There's a Concert by the Lake series that sponsors free concerts at The Harbor's amphitheater. Last night's act was a Beatles cover band, Me & My Monkey.

The mop-haired, wannabe Fab Four took the stage in matching dark-lapelled suits as though they were on The Ed Sullivan Show. Their "in character" between-song banter was amusing. And they put on a fun show.

But,...

I was reminded how much I don't like crowds. That whole area was packed with picnickers, partying fratboy-types, dog-walkers, oblivious canoodlers, wine-sipping conversationalists, and some guy who looked like William Katt circa Carrie.

None of those are bad in moderation (unless you don't like Carrie), but the crowd density was uncomfortable for me. It was one of those stake-out-your-area-with-lawn-chairs-or-blankets things. And I arrived late with neither chair nor blanket.

Now I know what to expect, if I want to consider returning for any subsequent weeks in the series. Looking at the roster of upcoming acts, the only one that draws my eye is a bluegrass Beatles cover band, Beatlegras (only one "s"). I think if you say their name three times in a row, you get to be in a Tim Burton movie.

I was listening to a recent episode (podcast) of American Public Media's The Story. One of the guests was the author of American Nerd: The Story of My People.

I'd always sorta considered myself a nerd. Or a geek. Though I never thought of either as a negative connotation. But, this author had some very specific ideas of what constitutes a nerd.

I disagree with him on some of the criteria he cites as nerd-defining.

But, I've always felt there was some manner of distinction between nerds and geeks. In my mind, I view the nerd as someone dedicated to knowledge and who somewhat (or wholly) eschews a deep connection to sports or outdoorsman activities -- except, perhaps, bird-watching. And, really, that's outdoors, but not outdoorsman. Bookish. Nebbish, even.

Nerds are content to forego (or oblivious to) the trappings of the popular clique.

The geek, I figure, is more of a techno-nerd. Able to program computers and up on the latest gadgetry and technology. Dedicated to scientific awareness.

Sure, the two share a common subset. But, being one is not necessarily being the other. I figure.

And I'm at a loss to comprehend why some members in society view nerds disparagingly. What's not to love?

I realize there are competing definitions out there. But, I still assume I'm a nerd. Or part nerd. But, not so much geeky.

Or maybe I'm just a dork.

I was listening to a couple of podcasts from American Public Media's The Story on my commute this morning. Fascinating stuff focused around the swine flu (H1N1) outbreak.

One episode told the story of a performance artist who’d packed herself off to Mexico City to meet people and interview them as part of a project. This involved her strolling a particularly long avenue through the city and engaging locals randomly. Her project happened to commence just at the onset of the viral infections making news.

There was also an interview with a lively centenarian who’d survived the 1918 Spanish influenza outbreak, which (brought home to America by returning WWI veterans) killed millions. When asked to compare the effects of the Spanish flu to a “normal” bout of flu, the elderly woman explained she has never had the flu since!

Also, another episode interviewed a Canadian paramedic who contracted SARS during its global outbreak.

I love podcasts. And my long commute affords me a prime opportunity to enjoy podcasts.

This morning, I spied a hardback book on the side of the road as I sped passed. I saw the telltale white square on the spine that told me it was a library book. After doubling back to check it out, I seized the serendipity to convince myself it was a book I should read.

I hopped out of the Jeep and discovered Anne Rice’s Blood Canticle, an apparent confluence of the Mayfair Witches and the vampire chronicles. Indeed, it was a library book from a public library in a nearby town. The only Anne Rice book I’ve read is Interview with a Vampire. So, I didn’t figure I should jump right to Blood Canticle.

The whole occasion, though, did feel good -- as if I’d performed a rescue. The stamp on the card inside the book’s cover indicated it isn’t due back to the library until Monday. And I wondered what circumstances conspired to leave it on the shoulder of a highway.

I have been secreted away in the dark recesses of an all-consuming project. I did not like it. But, I persevered.

Abiding is one of my superpowers.

So, I’m exhaling now. And I’m reflecting on a passage from Rivka Galchen's novel, Atmospheric Disturbances:

We get these wrong feelings sometimes,
feelings like articles slipped into our luggage
but not properly ours. I think of it like vestigial
DNA. Code for nothing, or for the wrong thing,
or for proteins that don't fold up properly and
that may eventually wreak great destruction.

Have you ever played that People-Watching Backstory Game where you imagine backstory or biography for the interesting people you see?

Some days ya see someone whose mere appearance and manner convince you they'd be fascinating to befriend. But, then you remember your misanthropic tendencies and brush aside the brief interlude of a friendship that never was.

In global hotspots, though it typically isn't the sort of flashy news peg to get much attention, it is true that the U.S. Army understands the power of non-violent opposition. Sounds silly, I know. I mean, it's an army -- and shouldn't that intrinsically imply the use of force? Well, yes. But, I guess the lesson is that force isn't always violent.

To wit: understanding the complexities of local socio-cultural nuances and mores will go a long way to better enable soldiers operating in that environment. Therefore, sometimes government contractors, such as social scientists and specialists, are imbedded with combat units to help develop non-violent options for stabilizing chaotic areas.

Back on my birthday, when we were all dashing to our local polling places to elect a new president, an incident happened in the southern Afghanistan village of Chehel Gazni, about 40 miles from Kandahar. I read about it months later.

A couple of Human Terrain Team contractors (Don Ayala and Paula Loyd) were on a foot patrol when one of them, a female (Lloyd), approached a local, Abdul Salam.

[This is the part of the story where I pause to remind you that these contractors are culturally knowledgeable and specifically tasked with seeking non-violent ways to help quell local disorder.]

Ms. Loyd was suddenly doused with a fuel jug Salam was carrying. And Salam set her on fire.

Loyd's fellow contractor, Ayala, apprehended Salam and detained him. But, when a soldier arrived on the scene a few minutes later and reported that Loyd was badly burned, according to an Army Criminal Investigation Division affidavit: "Ayala pushed his pistol against Salam's head and shot Salam, killing him instantly."

Loyd later died from her wounds. Ayala was taken into custody and charged with second degree murder in the shooting of Salam.

That is an intense situation (recalls the head-in-a-box scene near the end of the movie SEVEN). If you try and imagine being embedded in a combat unit in a war zone of a hostile region, seeing your friend doused with fuel and burned, it doesn't seem too far outside the likely human response to dispatch the guilty party. War tends to involve moments of killing.

I realize there are complexities here that prevent this from being a simple black-and-white issue. And, I can't say for sure what I would have done in a similar situation -- which is to say I could have very well done what Ayala did in a reactionary rage. It seems it isn't too far of a stretch to imagine that, in that moment, he was so emotionally overwrought as to be unstable, and, one might say, temporarily insane…and to consider that Salam bears some responsibility for inciting the incident via the heinous attack on Ayala's coworker (which resulted in the coworker's death).

Rules of engagement (ROE) can plague any person operating in a hostile zone. Someone removed from the front lines can easily determine, on some academic technicality, that a given incident qualifies as murder, whereas another event is justified as a "part of war."

And, certainly, rogue operators like BLACKWATER can overstep the bounds of acceptable force and kill indiscriminately under the umbrella claim of self-defense...and muddy (or, ahem, blacken) the waters on such matters.

It all furrows my brow.

When you go to an ER because you've caused a severe auto accident, and you're all banged up, sometimes you arrive strapped to a gurney with your clothes cut off.

This happened to me several years ago. The EMTs on the scene cut off my new Christmas clothes, leaving only the (fortunately clean) underwear. At the scene, they had to examine me for any breaks, or, heaven-forbid, compound fractures. It was freezing that night. And they left me (and my underwear) restrained on the gurney in the frigid weather of the hospital portico while they debriefed the nurses outside the ER.

Anyway, when they release you from such an ordeal, they give you a bag of your belongings. It contains the possessions off your person, even if they’ve been shredded up by EMTs doing their job.

I saw someone handed his belongings bag the other night on TV, like a mom giving her third-grader his sack lunch as he heads out the door for the school bus. And I find it a very existential exercise, to receive such a thing. It presents quite an ontological scenario -- summarily sending you on your way with a tidy, metaphysical bag of what represents you.

Do you ever consciously or subconsciously assign your own leitmotif?

This week, when walking down the hallway at work, or sitting at my desk typing an e-mail, or pulling the Jeep into traffic, I hear the opening strings of Led Zeppelin's "Kashmir" in my head -- the forthright drums giving them a sense of purpose and expectation.

(That's not what I would choose. It's the uninvited theme of the week.)

At professional baseball games, sometimes the players select a few bars of a favorite tune to blast over the speakers as they move from the on-deck circle to the batter's box. I've always wondered what I'd choose in such a scenario (certain, though, I'd never have to wrestle with such concerns of professional athletes).

Darth Vader gets his imperial theme to accompany his presence in the Star Wars movies. Brünnhilde and Siegfried are likewise musically announced in Götterdämmerung or Wagner's earlier operas of Der Ring des Nibelungen.

I'm still mulling.

There is a new book about the building of the Panama Canal. It is aptly titled The Canal Builders.



I read a quick review of this book on Time.com.

The book's author, Julie Greene, examines the workers who converged on Panama, displaced the earth, civil-engineered locks, and connected Atlantic waters with Pacific waters via a man-made artery through the Panamanian isthmus.

(Come on, History Channel, gimme a quality 1-hour documentary on Modern Marvels.)

Aside from the fact that this is exactly the sort of thing that fascinates me, I have a more personal cause to read about the lives of the workers who made the canal a reality. My paternal grandfather was among them. He went to Panama to work as a telegrapher.

I love that.

My grandfather -- born in the 1880s -- died when I was around 8 years old. I wish I had known him as an adult, because I think we would have had a strong connection. He looked a bit like E. B. White. And his physical similarity to one of my literary heroes has only served to heighten the myth that I've nurtured through the years.

Dad was pretty solidly blue collar, through and through. And I had a tremendous respect for him. But, his dad and I would have connected on a bookish level.

When I first learned of the Panama connection, I was mesmerized by the notion of my grandfather working on the canal. I conjured many fantasies (none of them based on any knowledgeable source) of what it might have been like for him.

This week happens to mark the 120th anniversary of my grandfather's birth. My dad was the youngest of his siblings, arriving later in my grandparents' lives. And Dad was 44-years-old when I debuted on the planet. So, the generations have been stretched out through the decades, ensuring that I have little insight and considerable curiosity about my grandfather's life.

I lived in a duplex in the summer of 1987. I was on summer break from college, and (in a dedicated move of independence) I didn't want to live with my parents. So, I got my own place.

I was working two jobs and getting home really late at night. And even though in the eyes of any observer I was living alone, I wasn't really. I was living with Bruce Springsteen.

I had a cassette tape of Nebraska. And I played that thing ragged. The national fad that Born in the U.S.A. had become was still lingering in the nation's collective mind. But, for me, it was all about Nebraska. It felt like I had unlocked an old trunk in the attic and found a treasure that no one knew about.

When I was younger, I had friends who would listen to an album rock station out of Dallas. Some of them stayed up one night recording The River. Then, they dedicated long hours to meticulously pouring over cassette tapes (there were two), pausing and rewinding, so the lyrics could be written down in a spiral notebook for reference and memorization.

By virtue of the fact I knew people that committed to Springsteen, I had written off the possibility that he could be cool or have any talent. But, in that musty old duplex, late at night, I was baptized in the bleakness of the Nebraska tracks, austere and unforgiving.

My little 9-inch black-and-white TV only picked up one local station, since I didn't have cable. So, my entertainment came from the old jambox, and I was an assiduous listener to the tales told by The Boss.

I just picked up Working on a Dream, and new Springsteen hearkens me back to old Springsteen, to those bygone days when I'd wake in the middle of the night and shuffle around the duplex. The wooden floors creaked, and there was no furniture other than my twin bed and the sleeper sofa in the living room left by a previous tenant.

I felt very transitory.

[KEYWORDS: Exploit Rogue spyware, ~tmpd.exe, Win32.ExpDwnldr, FakeAlert, adware, malware, Defender Pro, SpyNoMore]

I've had a problem with an infected desktop. And I wanted to share what happened, in case others are cruising the Net looking for a solution to their similar problem. Maybe the keywords listed above will help them find this blog.

* * * * *

So, my desktop has been protected by AVG, but it was infected yesterday.

I got some suspicious-looking "alert" pop-ups, and AVG found something it identified a FakeAlert adware. But, it wouldn't successfully delete it or quarantine it.

I decided (impulsively) to rush out and buy something to remove/quarantine this infection. Don't really have a lot of funds, so I bought the $20 Defender Pro. It found a few instances of infection and quarantined them or removed them. But, I don't think it recognized (or did anything with) the front-and-center offending malware. It still persisted, as I think it could heal itself or reinstall itself when you opened Internet Explorer or rebooted.

I was frustrated, because I'd dropped some money, and still my desktop was down for the count.

I got on my laptop (because the desktop will no longer access the Internet) and read up on what seems to be connected to these lovely things: "Exploit Rogue spyware," "~tmpd.exe," and "Win32.ExpDwnldr."

I found some information about all of these unholy troublemakers at exterminate-it.com. I downloaded the free scanning software from there and burn a CD to move it over to the desktop. It finds 23 instances of infections associated with these things. But, of course, ya gotta buy it to activate the part that will do the exterminating.

GRRRR. I already spent money on the Defender Pro. So, I go back to reading/researching online.

Then, I found a guy's blog. He said he had the same problem. He said his infection was completely handled by protection he bought from SpyNoMore.

I bite the bullet and buy the $40-software from SpyNoMore. I decide it is worth it to run my total up to $60 for the day, if it will completely take care of the infection.

SpyNoMore finds four instances of malware and removes them. But, you guessed it, that doesn't do the trick. Still have the FakeAlert dilemma. Still have the compromised processes and "~tmpd.exe" complications. Still can't access the Internet from the infected desktop.

So, I dashed off an e-mail to what appears to be a Help Desk for SpyNoMore. Of course, this was happening on the weekend, and I kept checking, but did not get a response. I don't wanna retrace my steps back to the exterminate-it site and buy their product, too. I've already dropped $60 that I didn't have budgeted to spend for computer infections.

The desktop is where I update my iPod. It has the iTunes library on it. I'm in a panic.

So, I finally put out a clarion call for support from my knowledgeable friends. I TOTALLY should have done that in the first place.

One pal suggested I download these two FREE programs:

-- Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware

-- Ad-Aware Anti-Spyware

And BAM! That does it. I have to reboot a few times when directed, because, for example, the pesky ~tmpd.exe file couldn't be fully removed or quarantined right then, but the Malwarebytes software designated it for deletion on reboot.

After that, all was good. I could access the Internet again, and the processes didn't seem to be compromised.

The annoying thing -- aside from getting the infection in the first place (of course) -- was that I dropped $60 on software to help...and none of it did the trick and hot rid of the infection. Sure, they helped. They found some things and cleaned up some files. But, they didn't do what I bought them for. Those two free applications I downloaded (listed above) did what I needed. So, I probably could have avoided spending ANY money if I had turned to my geek pals as a first line of defense.

Granted, the blog above where I first read about SpyNoMore was from a few years ago. And it likely did exactly has the blogger said...back then. But, the FakeAlert/ Win32.ExpDwnldr/~tmpd.exe/Exploit Rogue spyware has likely morphed since then.

Also, regarding SpyNoMore, it is possible than when they respond to my call for support through their Help Desk, that they can solve the problem, too. I was just getting antsy and not wanting to wait until after the weekend to get my infected computer repaired.

If you came here looking for a solution, I hope these work as well for you and they did for me.

Ensconced, as I am, in a hotbed environment of partisan conservatism, I had no expectation I'd have a chance to view today's inauguration, today's changing of the guard in our nation's capitol. I'd accepted that I'd read the text of President Obama's inaugural speech online. I expected to catch it via TiVo or perhaps an iTunes video podcast. Relive the event in its wake.

I didn't expect to find the inaugural events broadcast live on the large multimedia screens in our big theater conference room.

But, it was.

I happened by the double doors and was drawn in, where I joined a silent audience and listened to the final moments of President Obama's speech. I heard Elizabeth Alexander march confidently through her stirring poem, whose phrases and images were somehow given greater profundity by her measured cadence. I watched as Rev. Joseph Lowery delivered an ambitious, poetic, and uplifting benediction.

There was something momentous about viewing it live on those large screens, the sound system of the conference room somehow adding to the significance of the occasion.

And, yes, I felt hopeful.

Not entirely forsaking my natural skepticism of all things, I find myself eager to accept the best of the possibilities. And I won't let it be tainted by the naysayers who, despite anything, are bound to their acts and shouts of opposition with no purpose other than party allegiance -- who, to serve their specific agendas, cast judgment on those who do not rigidly comply with each plank in their personal philosophical platforms, unable to accept any gray in their black-and-white, right-and-wrong assessments.

Today is a day for girding loins.

And, yes, I am hopeful.

I remember, at the end of the '80s, when the Ayatollah Khomeini issued the fatwa against Salman Rushdie for perceived blasphemy in the novel The Satanic Verses. I say perceived, because my understanding is that Khomeini had not bothered to read the novel whose author he incited his followers to kill.

Christopher Hitchens, in a recent Vanity Fair article, posits that the fatwa was issued in a bid to regain some Islamic street cred after reneging on his vow to never sign a treaty with Saddam Hussein. Suddenly, with the utterance, Khomeini recast himself as the Defender of the Faith and shifted focus from his dealings with Hussein to the outrage of a novelist's [alleged] heresy.

The word itself is potentially fun to say -- conjuring images of a chubby guitarist using a wawa pedal. But, I remember thinking I'd soon hear of Rushdie's assassination. Next month will be the 20th anniversary of the fatwa, and Rushdie lives on (for now).

While I never heard the expected news of Rushdie's death, what I didn't know about until reading the Hitchens article, is the deaths of "supporting cast" players.

See? The fatwa didn't merely suborn Rushdie's murder, but was "fat" enough to encompass those "involved in its publication." Khomeini might have tossed in those "who read the blasphemous text," too, had that not opened the door on complicated explanations about whether or not he had read the offending novel himself. If so, he'd call for his own death. If not, how could he know?

The Japanese translator of Rushdie's novel, Hitoshi Igarashi, was stabbed to death. Ettore Capriolo, the Italian translator, was knifed in Milan. And The Satanic Verses publisher in Norway, William Nygaard, was shot thrice in the back outside his home in Oslo.

While I've heard reviews that the novel itself is middling and pedestrian, I figure it's time I read the thing for myself.

In most parts of the nation, the crisp air of January has arrived on the breath of a new year.

Bone-lit skies oversee our grayscale comings and goings.

So, I do the same balancing act, perched on the same fence. A dozen months behind me, and a clean year stretched out before me.

What to do? What to do? The tabula rasa for one and all.

* * * * *

Paul Valery, the French poet (essayist and critic), once remarked that "a poem is never finished, only abandoned." And I know what the man meant. I know it as a poet, having taken the time to compose a couplet or suss out a stanza -- only to finally leave it convinced I'm unable to find the missing aspect that will improve it and complete it. And I know it as a human, having left moments and deeds unresolved and untitled.

For me resolutions proclaimed for a New Year are merely parlor games, half-hearted mutterings to play along with others. I know many who take their New Year’s resolutions seriously. And I applaud it. But, I never have the passion or conviction to hold fast to those things. So, I generally dodge them.

But, I think there is something to this sense of resolution. And, while I can't convince myself that there'll be a list of resolutions checked off as the months are torn from the calendar, I can get behind the idea of seeking completion where I can. Instead of a New Year's resolution, rather a quest to resolve.

...I would sometimes descend the stairs,
unlock my bicycle, and pedal along the cold city streets
down a narrow side street
bearing the name of an obscure patriot.

I followed a few private rules,
never crossing a bridge without stopping
mid-point to lean my bike on the railing
and observe the flow of the river below
as I tried to better understand the French.

In my pale coat and my Basque cap
I pedaled past the windows of a patisserie
or sat up tall in the seat, arms folded,
and clicked downhill filling my nose with winter air.

I would see beggars and street cleaners in their bright uniforms, and sometimes
I would see the poems of Valery,
the ones he never finished but abandoned,
wandering the streets of the city half-clothed.

Most of them needed only a final line
or two, a little verbal flourish at the end,
but whenever I approached,
they would retreat from their makeshift fires
into the shadow-thin specters of incompletion,

forsaken for so many long decades
how could they ever trust another man with a pen?

-- Billy Collins, "January in Paris"

Moments ago, a large Cheshire moon hung low over the western horizon, grinning down at the darkened landscape.

I'll take that as the harbinger of good things in the year ahead.

"It is required of every man," the Ghost returned, "that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellowmen, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world -- oh, woe is me! -- and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!"

Again the spectre raised a cry, and shook its chain and wrung its shadowy hands.

"You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell me why?"

"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it. Is its pattern strange to you?"

-- Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

I'd totally forgotten Sydney Pollack died this year.

I was viewing the gallery of "those we lost in 2008" at the Time magazine website, and I saw Sydney Pollack. My first thought was "WHAT?" Then, I remembered. I remembered reading some good eulogies and obits on him. How could I forget? It's almost criminal to forget the dead.

Then, I saw where Anthony Minghella also died this year!

Many of the portraits also include a link in the blurb to connect you to an article from the magazine about the person's death.

Hop over there if you're curious or have a couple of minutes -- er, uh, I was gonna say "to kill"...but that is a poor choice of phrase.

I like seeing the year-end lists that show up in late December. The Top Ten ______ of 2008, or My Favorite _________ of 2008. That sort of thing.

At year's end, I always yearn to really encapsulate the Zeitgeist of the last dozen months with a fun, distilled reflection or cultural summation. But, I never seem to pull it off. I can never get my arms around the beast in any satisfactory way. And my attempts inevitably devolve into existential mush.

Bleh.

Recently, I left the office midday and drove into Dallas. I needed to do some research that required a visit to the seventh floor at the central branch (J. Erik Jonsson Central Library) of the Dallas Public Library, which happens to be across the street from city hall.

I stopped en route to score some Christmas gifts, as I'm always on the prowl for big sales and reduced prices, preferring to nab hot items during their loss leader phase. But, that absolutely drained all my funds. And I knew there'd be a modest expense for parking. (Parking is only free at that branch of the library if you are there for less than 15 minutes -- not wanting to penalize or dissuade patrons from returning books when they are due.)

Instantly, I thought of a no-cost plan. And I knew, despite any further consideration, that I would do it.

I parked in a nice (free!) parking garage at the Borders bookstore near West Village and caught the McKinney Avenue trolley (free!) which took me downtown to the Dallas Museum of Art.

From there, I walked across town to the library. Along the way, I passed Thanks-Giving Square (which, as far as I could tell, was actually a triangle), and I stumbled into a blocked-off area around the flagship Neiman Marcus department store. Streets were barricaded and film crews were on hand. Production folks were wandering around, and the store (and its windows) were outfitted with the trappings of Christmas decorations.

I walked forthrightly. And I strolled right through all of it. There was even a craft services-looking table with a lot of pizza boxes on it. And I considered getting a slice. But, I kept moving.

At the library, I spent hours pouring through microfilm and getting nauseous from the images of old newspapers sliding across the viewer. Though I didn't find exactly what I was looking for, I managed to find associated information that made the trip productive.

When I left the library and headed back toward the trolley, the hubbub at Neiman Marcus had geared up. Some hoity-toity folks were on a stage with Santa, thanking him for making an appearance and counting down to the moment when a switch was flipped and all the lights adorning the store were turned on.

It seemed odd to me that there was such a small crowd for such a large production. And it was even more curious that they were turning on the lights while it was still daylight. It was only later that I discovered what I saw was a dress/tech rehearsal for the "show" that night.

Not wanting to crash the barriers again, I opted to cut through the store itself.

Lemme tell ya: a fat guy in jeans and flannel is OUT OF PLACE in that swank store. I felt like a proverbial bear in a china shop. And I was quite happy to emerge from the other side.

I retraced my path back to the trolley stop and waited.

I don't spend a lot of time in downtown Dallas. Especially during a weekday.