My editor called me a couple of weeks ago to tell me my email had been hacked into and I should change my password.
I changed several passwords but was unable to change my email password. I went into yahoo mail and got the directions on how to change a password, printed them out, and then plugged them in.
It wouldn’t work, so I logged in to Yahoo mail support.
They took control of my computer and told me I had viruses and they would fix them, but there were three bad things coming in from the network, which he couldn’t fix, but he would turn me over to AVG Technologies (an antivirus software company) who could fix them.
AVG then took control of my computer and said he fixed several things.
When he was done, he charged me $399, which he said I should put on my credit card.
I refused, fearing it was a scam.
Finally, I agreed I would pay by check.
Once I hung up, I contacted a local computer repair company to make sure these people who said they were AVG weren’t actually scammers and hadn’t done something bad to my computer.
The local repair company checked everything over and advised me I did not have to pay the $399, as that cost was what AVG was charging me for a subscription to AVG protection, not for a repair and virus-cleaning service, and I was already subscribed to Norton Security for antivirus protection.
The new guys also found out that my computer was extremely slow and very old, but they believed they would be able to fix many of its problems.
They worked on it remotely but, of course, they could not make my computer new again, so I asked them to help me order a new one from Best Buy, which they did.
They said they would pick it up Thursday and bring it out to my house to transfer what was on the old computer to the new computer.
In the meantime, AVG called up and asked if I had mailed my check. I told them I wasn’t going to since I was getting a new computer and already had a paid subscription to Norton.
They were nice and I haven’t gone to jail yet, so I think I’m okay.
The new computer was to arrive on Thursday, which worked fine with my schedule since my sister-in-law was coming Wednesday to rent an apartment in Tallahassee and would be staying with me Wednesday night.
All was well.
Then, my new best friends (the local computer repair guys) called to tell me that Best Buy said the computer was coming in early and could they pick it up and bring it out Wednesday instead of Thursday.
I said sure since I thought they’d be done with it before my sister-in-law arrived.
Ha! She arrived at 4:45 p.m., and I couldn’t let her in the guest room, which is also my office and where the new computer and repairmen would be, so I set her up temporarily in my room until they were done.
They arrived at 5 p.m.
I fed my guest supper, fed some snacks to my computer worker, and then my guest, my cat, Nurse Judy (my always complaining alter ego) and I sat down and began watching movies.
After a while, we switched to watching things on Netflix and watched The Royal Prince.
The computer guy was still here.
Next, we watched The Royal Wedding.
The guy was still here.
Then, The Royal Baby (the final movie to the trilogy) came on.
My guest was yawning, the cat was sleeping and Nurse Judy was pacing around in a frenzy while I
was wringing my hands not knowing what to do.
It was now 11 p.m., and I hadn’t been up this late in ages.
The computer guy said he wasn’t finished but he was quitting for the night but would be back the next day.
The rest of us stumbled to bed once I got my sister-in-law into the guest room, which was now complete with two computers.
She bundled up like The Abominable Snowman, as she feared that maybe the one computer still working and pointing in her direction might be able to see her remotely through its webcam.
The next morning, my guest went off to do her business in Tallahassee and then drove back to the sanity of South Florida, glad to be rid of the insanity of our household.
A realtor came by at noon and stayed until 2 p.m., and a few minutes later, the computer man was back and stayed until 5 p.m.
This was the most activity in my house since the pandemic!
The computer man hadn’t even gotten home yet when I had to call him back, because I couldn’t make something work on the computer.
Today, as I write this, it is Friday and I was unable to figure out a bunch of things on my new computer, so I had to call the company again and asked them to help me through my long list of questions for another long period of time.
They sounded so relieved when I finally hung up.
I think they are mad at me and thinking of blocking me from their phone number by now.
Nurse Judy is sulking because I can’t remember my password to check on her sparkly sweater order that we purchased online. Beebe stomped on the computer keyboard to show his displeasure at having his supper delayed…and Heaven knows what problems that stomping may have caused.
The neighbors all think I must have something going with the computer guy, who is 50 years my junior since he’s either here or I’m on the phone with him all the time.
And me? I am a certified maniac-all because of a blankety-blank computer.
More later,
Judy
nursejudyinfo.com