The road to redemption.

In this post: Irrational panic at Howdygram headquarters.

It’s 10:45 Sunday morning and I am compelled to report that I had a wild yet strangely crappy night. It began around 2 a.m. when I wound up with a freaky, spammy web page on my Mac bearing the FBI’s logo and announcing “we have seized your browser and your browsing history” — seriously, I couldn’t close the window or quit Firefox! — with “enough proof to convict” that I’d been dowloading music illegally and/or accessing child porn.

It was late. I was tired. I panicked. Stupid, I know, since I’ve never downloaded music in my entire life and I’m not especially nuts about any kind of porn. If the “and/or” language didn’t give them away it should’ve been that credit card form at the bottom of the page demanding payment of the FBI’s $300 fine within 24 hours to unlock my browser and drop all charges. No kidding, people, I went to bed trying to decide if Sam would get mad at me if I paid the fine without telling him.

This morning, however, the road to redemption definitely seemed a little clearer. I accessed the “Get Info” feature on my Mac to check out the issue with Firefox, and apparently last night’s spammer just ran a simple script that locks a browser application. So the Howdygram’s on-staff technical support specialist — i.e., yours truly — unlocked Firefox with a mouse click and the FBI window never reappeared.

I need to celebrate. I think I’ll bake myself a low-carb chocolate cake and find a way to spend the $300 I just saved. I am equally excited about both of these activities.

Thank you for reading this.