My Virusesissues

Say what you will about Pontius Pilate, but he never caught the flu virus.

He washed his hands.

Never mind.

The Centers For Disease Control has changed its mind.

What they are now calling—not taco flu, nor swine flu, nor H1N1—but Novel Influenza, they say this new flu is not as dangerous as previously thought.

In a May 5^th directive entitled Update on School (K – 12) and Childcare Facilities: Interim CDC Guidance in Response to Human Infections with the Novel Influenza A (H1N1) Virus at http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/K12_dismissal.htm , the CDC says:

School closure is not advised for a suspected or confirmed case of novel influenza A (H1N1) and, in general, is not advised unless there is a magnitude of faculty or student absenteeism that interferes with the school’s ability to function.

Schools that were closed based on previous interim CDC guidance related to this outbreak may reopen.

That’s good.

I’m glad our health department proved so vigilant in protecting us from this potential threat. Good job, guys.

Be that as it may, I have picked up a virus anyhow.

At least my computer did.

My firewall tells me my computer is under attack from a Deep Throat Trojan Horse virus which is trying to take over my system.

How could I get this virus?

I wash my hands.

When my virus software alerted me to the attack, I shut down the system and called my son Donald, a computer network manager, for help. Yesterday, he, my friend Wes, and I enjoyed breakfast at Dave’s Diner, then they came to my house for conversation and computer repair.

It occurs to me that my computer could catch a virus in one of three ways:

Maybe it came into my machine through the remote server?

But Donald assures me that the firewall would have blocked it.

Maybe I caught it when browsing the internet looking for photos of naked ladies?

That can’t be, because Wes recently caught the same virus and I assure you that Wes is not the kind of Christian who would ever browse for photos of naked ladies on the internet.

Maybe I caught the virus from a plishing site. (is that the right word?) I mean a website set up to look like it’s from one source but is really something else malicious.

I think that may be the case because last week while looking for CDC information about swine flu, one link I opened generated a pop-up box warning that it was not a real CDC site but a plishing trap.

Wes said that he’d encountered that same thing. While googling swine flu, he also encountered a plishing site claiming to be a CDC page, and he has since found a virus in his computer.

Anyhow, Donald fixed stuff by going to that black and white screen in the bios that I am never, never, never ,ever never to touch.

Donald fixed it and I’m back on line now.

In spite of the Taco Flu virus scare and the Deep Throat Trojan Horse computer virus scare, we three guys had a great time smoking pipes and discussing the whole state of Christ’s church and the world.

Donald is praying about perhaps going to seminary and becoming a minister in his church.

I mentioned my own belief that “Where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I in the midst of them” and I said, We, the three of us sitting here, we are the church”.

Wes said, “We’re not a church—we’re a bull session”.

Donald said, “O Phooey. And here I was just about to take up a collection”.

He thinks like a preacher already.

I wash my hands of the matter.