Crusty Computer

Right now I'm sitting at the internet computer at home that no one uses. There are two computers that access the internet, both in Mom's room. Sometimes when Mom doesn't want to go to the trouble of using the other computer, she uses this one. Since it doesn't load websites, she quickly gives up. Recently, she called Alexie and Andrew down to take a look at the computer and figure out why the internet is running so slowly. Both of them had no idea what was going on and moaned endlessly about their uselessness. (Teenagers tend to plead ignorance whenever their parents want them to work. I know since I am one.) They aren't scientists, you see, rocket or otherwise.

Any good scientist, or any person with an ounce of logic, would have noticed that the internet will work if you are logged in to the username Teaching Tools, but not if you are logged into David. The reason? The username David has dozens of viruses and updater agents running every second you are logged in. The viruses don't slow down the computer because of sinister design, they slow it down because there are so many of them clogging up the computer's circuits. The reason I know this is when I log off of "David" so that I can use the internet, half a dozen programs with names like "BLGOFGupdateragent.exe" and "COMPUTERAIDS.exe" all have problems shutting down and so therefore each pop up errors that require you to press "end now" to move through them all. If I were trying to fix the problem, I'd start there. It is a problem when your computer is so old, even its viruses are decrepit.