Well, it has been one hell of a frustrating week around here. Last weekend was weird enough but then Sunday, I awoke to discover that the cable internet was out. After calling all day and being assured by a robot that it was an area-wide problem and technicians had been dispatched, I finally held for a human being and scheduled an appointment for a tech to come to my house. But not til Tuesday.

Tuesday, the cable guys came by and told me that something was seriously effed with the connection. Something, they reckoned, that was in the cable under the house. They had to schedule a different tech to come out to fix that and it would be Saturday before he could make it.

Wednesday, I got some nasty spyware/adware on the computer while using it at my parents’ house. Without the internet at home, I couldn’t do anything to research what the hell I had. I just did scan after scan hoping to disinfect it.

Thursday, I don’t know what happened but something pissy surely. Oddly, the internet connection seemed to restore itself completely by Thursday night. I fought the spyware as bravely as I could.

Friday, I had internet all day. How my bad wiring fixed itself is a question that only the cable company can answer. I tried to fight the spyware and get some work done but one frustrated the other. Then in the late afternoon, a couple of people got really pissy in the comments of NashvilleZine and seriously rubbed me the wrong way.

At issue was our “coverage” (if you can call a tongue-in-cheek shout-out to our blog friends at TNF “coverage”) of crazy Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes. Apparently, this new celebrity coverage on the Zine made three people upset. So upset they left dumb comments instead of just, you know, scrolling right past the post. As the Zine’s defender in the comments said, they might have had a point if we weren’t covering music as well as before but we’re doing more and better coverage of music. So what’s a couple of pop culture news items? Jesus.

Friday night, I went to see Harper and The Kyle Andrews Fun Team. both kicked a lot of ass. I am looking-forward to watching Harper grow as a band. Their songs have so many changes in them that as they get tighter, the songs will definitely develop new dynamics. The Kyle Andrews Fun Team had me totally fooled. The mp3s I heard were very alt-country sounding with a bunch of weird little noises, but live, they’re just a straight-ahead rock band. Like an indie Tom Petty. Actually, Kyle’s voice sounds a lot like Aaron from Imaginary Baseball League, but the songs aren’t as melodramatic as Aaron’s band.

Saturday–here’s where the frustrating week gets ridiculous–in the middle of trying yet another fix for the spyware on my computer, I stretch my arms. And I pull something so badly that I get dizzy. Pain just shoots through my shoulder. I was completely hobbled. I sat at home while my girlfriend did laundry and after a couple of Tylenols, I was okay to move around. We did housework the rest of the afternoon and evening. The good news is that everything finally looks neat enough that I’m happy to be in the house. There are still some boxes that need emptying but we’re comfortable for now.

Today, we cleaned up more and I finally (fingers crossed) think I fixed the spyware problem thanks to the incredibly helpful people at iamnotageek.com. I’m still worried about it though. I’ve made Firefox my default browser and I’m going to be way more vigilant. Even though mine was a pretty minor infestation and I caught it early, I do not want to go through that again. If I wanted to think about it, I’d get extremely angry. Who do these spyware/adware mothereffers think falls for this shit? I didn’t click on any of the damn pop-up windows and all it did was make me angry at the companies advertising. I really don’t want to revisit that horrible experience.

Oh, ahh, I wish there were a punch line.

We did have my parents over for dinner tonight for Father’s Day. My dad brought us a grill that we used to cook some huge and tasty hamburgers. I gave my dad a copy of Cox & Forkum‘s Black & White World II. Allan Forkum gave me a signed copy of it last week. I think it’s pretty damn cool. So I hope my dad does. After they left, I finished the spyware cleansing and have been sitting here typing pretty much ever since. Now, I must stretch.