stupid IT.....

1. my computer starts running slowly on friday, i wonder why

2. i start getting pop-ups, even when offline, i now know i have spyware

3. i do the typical ad-aware, spybot, microsoft beta, adware-away check-ups. it helps for about a half hour and then i start getting them again.

4. i pull out the big guns and do a "hijack this" scan and find a file called RPC helper.

5. the file description says "allows users to change registry settings remotely"

6. i view this as very very bad, so i disable the file in services.msc

7. my computer dies

8. apparently this RPC helper is a background program the IT guys here put on the computers so they can do stuff on the computer without actualy being at the computer. also, every program needs this enabled in order to work.

9. i frustratingly spend the afternoon rebooting in safemode to try and salvage anything i can.

10. i break down and give my computer to the IT guys here. they do CPR for two days and then tell me they just have to give me a new hard drive and they won't be able to get anything off my old drive..... two years of data/files/job history gone..... this angers me

11. they tried some more and eventually got the folders that were on my desktop copied over, but that's it.

12. i get my "new" computer and now i have to spend the week trying to get all the little settings i'm used to back to they way they were = annoying

lessons learned:

a. backup everything on your computer frequently

b. don't disable/delete anything till you know what it is

c. IT guys are complete idiots most of the time, though i'm jealous that they all wear hawiian shirts to work