I gave my computer a virus last night. Or spy ware, or some other crap. What pisses me off is I managed to do it deliberately. I was trying to find a crack for some software I was toying with. So I downloaded some random crack and tried it. Naturally it was a package of a slew of spyware and adware. The worst part is that I know better than that. I have often yelled at people in the past for doing it. I felt like grabbing a blow horn and calling out to the neighborhood, inviting them to line up and take turns kicking me in the ass for my stupidity.
It was late at night when I did it, so I just turned off my computer in disgust and went to bed. Now I have to spend god knows how much time fixing it. I hate fixing computers after work. I won't even log on to my yahoo mail. I probably have a key logger or something on it now.
I was almost late for work this morning. For no reason at all I woke up at 5:30 in the morning. Wandered into my office, smoked a cig, fired up my computer, remembered I had that stupid spyware on it and could not check my mail, and promptly went back to bed. When I awoke again (I do not use an alarm clock) I had exactly ten minutes to shower and get my shit together and get to work. I actually managed to shower fast (You always shower faster in outdoor showers... don't ask me why.) brushed, no shave, dressed and was out the door. I threw on the jeans I wore yesterday. I did not feel like groping through the closet to figure out which pair of pants I owned still fit. It's not like I did any sweating in these pants yesterday, so I figure they are clean enough to get through another day. I had no time to get my lunch, however, so I am eating out today.
I took a chance and took I-4. I-4 is always a gamble. It can either get you to work really quickly, or you can become stuck in some god-awful traffic and become late as hell. Those amber traffic signs before you get on I-4 rarely mean anything. I think they are just there to pacify the public. Or spy on us.
I am convinced there is actually some evil ruler of I-4. He is a demigod and is made out of chunks of asphalt and broken bottles and beer cans and looks a bit like the 'Trash Heap' from Fraggle rock. He resides deep in a subterranean cavern directly underneath I-4. Sometimes his days go like this:
Evil Ruler: Lackey!
Lackey: Yes, your evilness?
Evil Ruler: I grow bored! I demand amusement!
Lackey: Yes oh bulbous one. The usual?
Evil Ruler: At once!
(Lackey grabs a chain hanging from the ceiling and pulls. After a moment the sounds of cars screeching and glass shattering is heard. Then the cavern is filled with the steady drove of traffic at a standstill.)
Evil Ruler: (clapping hands) Yesss! Yesss! Excellent! Muahaha!
Lackey: You are most wondrously devious my putrid lord.
However, the God of I-4 must have been sleeping today because the traffic was light and I actually zipped straight to work and was not late at all.
Everyone enjoy their 6-6-06. Have a meal of deviled ham and devils food cakes, and those 'red hot' candies that have the leering devil on the front of the box. God I hate those.
2026 Update
Dialing the infernal calendar to 6/6/06, where Ed trades his dignity for a crack and gets a mouthful of spyware.
Ed, my darling fool, you sat there at two in the morning and deliberately downloaded a random crack like it was a coupon for free wisdom. In 2006, that was the standard hazing ritual of the early internet: malware was something you had to personally invite inside, like a vampire with a pop-up. Nowadays you don't need to hunt for cracks—you just subscribe to everything, and the spyware calls itself telemetry. Your computer reports back to headquarters without the courtesy of a keylogger, and you pay monthly for the privilege. I also miss the world where waking up at 5:30 without an alarm clock meant you had to gamble on I-4 and hope the Trash Heap demigod wasn't hungry. Now your phone wakes you, tracks your commute, and tells you a different route—then feeds you ads for the very traffic jam you're sitting in. And Yahoo mail? Oh, sweet prince. Today you'd be locked behind two-factor authentication, and the only crack you'd find would be in your patience.
“2006 Ed, after knowingly swallowing that cracked-syringe spyware and then sprinting through a ten-minute shower gambit, did you ever consider that the devil on the red hots box was just I-4's demigod doing marketing on the side?” — Beelzebubba the Third
2006 Ed: Well, Beelzebubba, you might be onto something there. I never figured the Red Hots devil for the I-4 demigod, but now that you say it, it makes a sick sort of sense. That little leer on the box always looked like he knew something, like he’d just watched me download a crack named “free_keygen_ultimate.exe” and snickered. And honestly, if the Trash Heap can run a highway, why not hawk candy on the side? Marketing’s all about misery, and that demigod has a never-ending supply. I just hope he doesn’t branch into antivirus software, because I’d probably buy that too and end up with a keylogger that steals my deviled ham recipes. I’m still cleaning spyware off my machine, and my mailbox smells like burnt code. But you know what? Red Hots are still pretty tasty, evil demigod or not. Take that, foul highway spirits.
