Sunday, September 16, 2012.
Iranian Pizza. Attack. Food Report From The Other Side Of The World.
The biggest job I have to dispatch before leaving on the cruise the Friday is to record all of the commercials that I would normally voice live on the radio show. This is a process that takes hours, and it's definitely 99 percent perspiration. It's my least favorite part of traveling. Fortunately, I have the equipment to do most of it at home. I set aside a big chunk of the day for it, but one thing after another got in my way.
Mary Ann said we were going to a pizza party at the home of a long-time friend. She's a young widow for several years, and lately she has a new beau. He's from Iran and wanted to make pizzas for everybody. Seemed to know what he was doing, juggling three pizza stones in two ovens. I think he made about two dozen pizzas, with a wide variety of ingredients. The best was a cheese pie with a lot of garlic, which he warned everyone about. He seems to go along with the stereotype of the American palate in believing that we don't love garlic.
Back at the ranch, I took a nap and entered the light labor of recording the radio commercials. I must do these ad-lib, but there's something funny that happens when these are being recorded. Something in brain shifts, and the process doesn't come as easy as it usually does. Then I wind up spending fifteen minutes taking long pauses and minor flubs out. This is true even though I know that a commercial with a casual, imperfect delivery is more effective than a tightly-produced one.
I was thinking about that when a popup on my screen informed me that the anti-virus software had just plucked a trojan from my machine. It said I didn't have to do anything. But the popup window had a button that said Close.
I know better than to click things like that. Even when--as was the case now--the window looks perfectly authentic. When something unexpected like that appears, the best bet is to shut down the computer as quickly as possible, preferably without clicking on anything. Then restarting it.
But I clicked it. The rest of the evening--until one in the morning--was spent dislodging this invader. I exhausted all my tools, then shelled out the $90 to get McAfee's technicians in India to pry the problem out. In the meantime, the techie and I had a pleasant conversation about Indian food. He loves dosa, the crepe-like dish of southern India. And he likes his food very, very peppery.
[Note to concerned reader: This thing never spread from my desktop, neither to my two alternate computers nor to this website. No emails were sent from my infected computer. My mailing lists do not reside on my desktop computer.]
Talk about ruining an otherwise good day! This sort of thing really gets under my skin, more than it should.
