Norton Internet Security 2006 Day

I love spending an inordinate amount of time wallowing in the tedious. This morning, after several other reminders over the last few weeks, which is annoying in itself, Symantec reminds me that my antivirus protection expires tomorrow. Well, with all the passive aggressive techno twits in the world creating malicious code for no apparent reason, I thought I better get that handled. So I clicked on Earthlink's "connect" button and set about making some green tea. I don't suffer the dial up noise well. That is another story, though.

Settling in with tea in hand, looking full on beat up in a pair of sweats and needing to shave--seriously, my face looked like a Brillo pad--, I click on the window that takes me to Symantec's website. Now to decide which product to choose from. Well, I had the Norton Anti-Virus 2003. Naturally, I'd updated that a couple of times. It's always worked well. No viruses. But then I happened upon Norton Internet Security 2006. I'm the curious sort, so I clicked on the button to learn more about the product. It contains anti-virus, a personal firewall, anti-spamware, and--this was the clincher--it had anti-spyware. Bonus! My subscription to Spyware Doctor expires in a couple of days as well, and it's going to cost me $50 to renew that subscription. So with Norton Internet Security 2006, I get everything I need for $50. Hard to beat. So, for $15 more than I planned to spend on virus protection, I actually save some cash. Love it, love it. But this choice would prove epochal.

I clicked on the "buy now" button, filled out the payment information, and clicked on the "download" button. Now, the window pops up that tells you how long it is before the file downloads. It reads "30 minutes." About what I expected. I take a sip of tea. Numi makes some awesome tea. I drink their black tea as well. Really good, if you like black tea. My cat jumps in my lap, and I talk in some voice that I would never want anyone to hear coming out of my mouth. But he seems to appreciate it. A glance back at the computer screen, and now my download time is an hour. Not what I remember, but okay. Booting the cat out of lap I make my way to the bathroom, depositing my cup on the kitchen counter along the way. I get back, sit down and look at the computer screen. Are you fucking serious? Three hours and thirty-five minutes to download. I understand, fully, that my dial up status is contributing to my download time. But seriously, I don't think it can take all the blame here. I glance at my watch: 10 AM. I guess I'll go workout while Symantec does its thing.

Around 11:30 AM I get back from the gym. I put in an hour on the treadmill and did some ab work. A decent workout. Not great, but decent. My cat meets me at the door, and we exhange pleasantries. That voice again. I just know I'm going to slip and do that in front my friends at some point. I'll never live it down. My friends possess nothing that resembles mercy. Since the workout didn't take long, or at least 3 hrs. and 35 mins., I didn't bother checking on the download status. Instead, I went straight to bedroom, peeled--and I do mean peeled--off my sweaty clothes, and headed to the shower.

Finishing up there and dressed, I start pouring through the fridge for something to eat. My eyes landed on some frozen Maryland Style crab cakes in the freezer. Pour some oil in a 10" skillet, flip a couple of times and enjoy. Just about right. While I'm banging around the pots and pans cabinet looking for a 10" skillet, I wonder whether or not my download is finished. I get some olive oil in the pan, grab some water and move to the computer. Hoping I get lucky.

Oh, happy day! It's 12:30 PM and the download is all finished. I don't eat McDonald's, but I'm loving it! So,oh, I didn't mention that I run Firefox Mozilla as my browser--it's killing Internet Explorer--and you click on an "open" button and, then, you are alerted to the fact that you're opening an executable file and it could contain malicious code and yada-blah, etc. I click on it, and go check on the crab cakes.

Crab cakes were coming around rather nicely, suprisingly. Frozen anything doesn't instill much confidence. But, what're ya gonna do? I check on the download. It's extracting files. Cool. I checked my Email. Nothing spectacular, really. A couple of Emails from Careerbuilder.com. Another from Monster.com. My boy in Houston dropped me a line. Cool, cool. Here is where it begins to get annoying.

The dialogue box tells me that I have another version of Norton AntiVirus Protection--I know that--and I will have to uninstall it and then run the extraction again. Annoying, but okay. Honestly, what're you gonna do but uninstall the older program. I glance at the time: 1:05 PM. I hit the control panel, find Norton Antivirus 2003, hit "change" and wait. A window pops us letting me know that I am about to delete NAV. And it wants to know if I'm sure this what I want? I'm not sure of much, but I am sure of this. I click "yes." Then, it begins its process. The little bars start their thing, and I wonder about the crab cakes.

I turned the crab cakes, smashed them down a bit, actually. They had this shape that reminded me of a dome stadium or something. Anyway, they didn't have far to go before they were done, so I just hung in the kitchen. Opened the fridge, thought about the odd beer, then decided against it. I planned on doing some preparation for the MPT portion of the bar exam today. I can't believe I haven't passed the bar yet. Completely unexpected. Never had a problem with a standardized test in my life, and here comes the bar. A knock at the door snaps me out of my pity party. "UPS," someone yells.

Hmmmm. I didn't order anything. So I'm wondering what the wife bought. I answer the door, sign for package and start shaking the brown box that the man dressed in brown handed me. No clue, and, since it's not addressed to me (ain't that a bitch?) I set it on the couch and go back to the crab cakes. They're ready to go. I slide them on a plate and head to the computer.

The removal is complete so now I can open the NIS files again. It starts its extracting thing again. Whatever, whatever. The crab cakes are surprisingly tasty. Better in Maryland, I'm positive. But when you're in Colorado, and you love seafood, you do what you can when you can. The time is 1:20.

I have MSN Instant Messenger and my wife is normally online, so I tell her that UPS just brought her something. No, I have no idea who it is from. No, I don't know where it is from. It has your name on it. That's the extent of my knowledge. She supposes she will take a look at it when she gets home. I suppose the same. It's 1:35.

Finally, NIS does its thing and now I need to restart my computer. Cool, cool, cool. Nothing unusual here. I restart my computer. I think I have too much stuff on computer. It takes forever to restart. But, finally, it does. The programs start loading. Spyware Doctor alerts me that I can upgrade for free. Smugly, I decline. I'm so smart. I went with NIS2006. More time passes. Then a window pops up, "Norton Internet Security has determined you have not restarted your computer." Um, actually, yeah, I did. But whatever. Start, restart, wait for the whole process to start again.

My cell phone rings. It's my brother. Cool, cool. Apparently, he bought a 55" screen television from Best Buy, and it promptly didn't work. So he called them, they came out and took it in. It needed a new motor. A new motor? Never thought a TV had a motor in it. Him either, but quickly tells me that's beside the point. They've had the TV for a month. I asked him if that is how long it takes to figure out you don't know what the hell you're doing. We laugh. I notice that my computer has restarted, and there is a box that says, "Norton Internet Security has determined you have not restarted your computer." My laughter fades as I restart my computer, again.

My bro continues on about how he went down to Best Buy and went off. Funny how a pissed off 6'4" 270 pound man can improve not only customer service, but their manners as well. He was watching his 60" screen television as we spoke. Someone calls and he needs to go. He'll call me back to tell me about the electronic leviathan.

Meanwhile, my computer is in the process of restarting. I go down to get the mail. It's creeping up on 2:30.

Nothing major in the mail. Credit offer for my wife. Credit card offer for me. From the same company. Imagine that. Credit card offer for me. Credit card offer for my wife. From the same company, again. Imagine that. A handful of coupons and ads. Chicken breasts are $3.99 a pound at King Soopers. Sirloin $6.99 a pound. Whatever. I toss most of it in the trash. Lament the weather and check on the computer. "Norton Internet Security has determined that you have not restarted your computer."

My hands are curled into tight fists, teeth grinding and I'm beginning to sweat. I resist the urge to wail on my computer and, instead, turn it off. I go in the kitchen, open the fridge and grab a beer. Taking a long pull, I head toward the balcony.

Looking out toward the horizon while drinking my beer, I fantasize about throwing the maker of NIS2006 off the balcony. I finish my beer and go back inside. It's a bit cool out for this time of year anyway.

I hit power on my PC and remind myself that this isn't exactly an inexpensive item. I promise myself I won't punch it, slap it, throw it or stomp on it if I get "the message" again. Luckily, I didn't get "the message." Half-hearted is the only way to describe my promise.

It's 3:15 and the day is slipping away. I want to go to the Public House for a few beers with friends tonight, but it doesn't look like it's going to happen. They have a killer happy hour. For $10 it's all you can drink from 7-9PM. It's almost Kevorkian.

So this time everything starts up without a hitch. Except that I have to register my software and in order to do that, I must create a log on account with Symantec. Now, when in the process of buying this thing, I had to give them a password and all this crap. But now they are asking for my login name and a password, and they are not accepting my password. Then, I get this message that says enter the product key that came with the confirmation Email. I'm sure you can guess by now, but I'll tell you anyway. No confirmation Email.

Just as I'm looking for a number to Symantec, the Email comes through. I enter the password and product key code and everything starts install and set up. I'm certain you've endured this process more than once. It's about 3:45 PM.

The program does its set up thing, and then, almost unbelievably, I get a message that reads, "LU1847: NIS 2006 was unable to retrieve the definitions list because of corrupt files." So I went to their website where I manually downloaded the virus definitions that I needed. It took 40 minutes to download that file. Aftewards I had to, once again, restart my computer.

In the end, the program works fine and I saved a buck. Considering, however, that the whole process wasn't completed until almost 5PM, I'm less than excited about ever ordering a different product in the future. Next year, I'll just get the update to NIS2006. I wasted an entire day with this thing. Absurd, and never again.