Frustrated with My Computer!

[happymommy114]

I just need to vent a bit right now. 

My computer is so frustrating - I'd like to throw it out the window sometimes!!  This morning I woke up to a message from some Privacy Center thing that said my license had expired, and it wanted me to pay to renew.  Well, I never subscribed to it in the first place, so why should I pay money to continue something I didn't need?  Then it kept popping things up saying that I had spyware trying access my computer. One even said there was a trojan horse that was sending emails to everyone in my address book - stupid program listed the email addresses it said it was sending stuff to, and I'd never heard of any of them!  I ran my anti-virus program, and it found a few things to quarantine.  Things seem to be working a little better since then, but I'm still not back to normal. 

It wouldn't be a huge deal, but I work from home, and working online is mainly what I do, so I need my computer to keep working.  Internet Explorer is what I usually use, but it isn't working properly.  Luckily, I downloaded Mozilla a month or two ago.  I haven't used it and was considering uninstalling, but thank goodness I didn't because that is the only way I can get online right now! 

I have a brother who's specialty is computer security, so hopefully he'll be able to talk me through fixing my problems.  I'm usually pretty good at getting things figured out on my own, but this one has me stumped.  I do still have my dinosaur desktop computer, so if I have to, I can always use that to keep up with work.  It just isn't quite as convenient as the laptop, which I can use out on the front porch while my daughter is playing in the yard or on the couch while we're watching TV, etc, etc.  Oh well, I'm sure I'll get it figured out eventually. 

Thanks for "listening" to my rant!!  ;)