Blaster worm

Date: 7:48am, 03 Feb 2012

We appear to be surrounded by infection this week. Not only is daughter one off sick with a bad cold and temperature, but daughter three could hardly speak mid-week and had to resort to notes [much as I suspected this was just a ruse to get cough sweets]. The baby has also had a sore throat. Daughter three's school told me something called slapped cheek syndrome is circulating and it begins with a sore throat. Oh dear.

Not content with most of the family coming down with an infection, the computer had to join in. There I was happily surfing the net trying to find out something on social media marketing. I hit on a site that looked good, although I must admit I thought the picture of the social marketing person was a tad odd. It was of a woman pouting and packed with make-up. Uh oh. Within seconds, the computer had thrown a wobbly and the legend "you have been infected with W32 Blaster worm virus" flashed up. I turned immediately to my technical support team.

"Daughter one, come in here immediately," I said, congratulating myself that I had kept her off school sick on the precise day that her presence was vital. Normally daughter one just needs to look at a technical problem and it fixes itself. This Blaster worm, however, was so fiendish it was beyond even her powers. It also meant stopped me getting into any emails and I had two interviews lined up with people whose numbers were stuck in emails. Arg.

Technical support consulted her Blackberry and I got the numbers plus lots of conflicting reports on how to rid my computer of the Blaster worm. None of them seemed to do what they said in the way they said they would. Eventually I found the blighter and deleted it with gusto, returned the computer to its factory state and patted myself on the back. The thing is I have no time for Blaster worms. They are not factored into my day and mean I end up having to work round them, rather like I work round the children, the pets and my partner who has begun emailing me from work saying he misses me even though he sees me every night. So, there I was at around midnight catching up after an evening spent celebrating Harry Styles birthday with SFC chicken nuggets [we know how to live, Harry] and waiting for the kitten to come in. He had decided to venture out late on the coldest night of the year so far. Typical.

I eventually crawled to bed, thinking I would have a half-hour lie-in because daughter one was still sick, but oh no, the baby decided to wake up early and holler. He did have a sore throat, but it is hard to explain to a small person than hollering will not help. Just as it is difficult to get across to him that Wii remotes [his current security blanket] do not go in baths. Then Peppa Pig decided to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star from the bottom of the bed and it seemed hardly worth attempting to pretend the day had not already started.

View Mum on the Run's other Blog Entries

Related tags: Computer virus | Sickness