You guys are sooooo crazy!! I can always depend on you for a good laugh as well as good information. I empathize with all the aching body parts!! It is amazing that when we are doing the things that we love, they don't ache so much, until much later! As for the acronyms, you should be in the Insurance Business, Senior market!! The government has the market cornered on acronyms, it's like learning a new foreign language every few months! DGMS Dianne

GG3300, you sure that was the link ya intended, goes to a myspace page. While I'm here, I might as well hijack the thread some more.... Well spring has sorta sprung up here, pret'near all the snow is gone, just a few patches on the north side of tree lines and such. Got my first 6 truck loads of yard waste today. Looks like mostly bags of leaves from last fall but some are the grass thatch stuff from peoples lawns. Time to get at 'er I guess. Although they are talking periods of snow for tomorrow. Hope it holds off until the afternoon at least cause there should be another 10 loads delivered tomorrow. Lloyd

Neal I take it you are a little intimidated with the inner workings of your computer? Nothing wrong with that. I was terrified the first few times I took the side cover off. However you must decide if you are going to get past that and fix it. You have asked for help and it has been given but you do not appear to have tried many of the suggestions so far, or have not told us what happened when you did try things. So far we know you cannot use Internet Explorer so you cannot download and install necessary updates from Microsoft. Nor can you go to online scans because most if not all of those are set up for IE. We know your AVG is at least 6 months out of date and the wrong version making it vitually useless. We know you do not have a firewall so anybody and everybody with the savvy can (and probably have) attack your computer and the dozens of phone home spies installed on your machine are taking possession. We know you cannot get to anti virus sites, for me that says virus's and trojans are in control of your computer. At this state it is pointless to worry about if your teenager's actions have caused the problems. Those actions may not have helped but the responsibility here is yours because you failed to take precautions needed for safe computing. From the computer you are using to post here download the free AVG 7.5 from here then from here download the free AVG anti spyware and from here download the free AdAwareSE and from here download the free Zonealarm firewall and finally from here download Crap Cleaner. Save all these to a thumb drive or burn to CD. Now on your computer and remove the cable to the internet for now. Then click Start, click Control panel, click Add/Remove programs. Remove AVG, AdAware and anything else that pertains to safety but is out of date. Install and run Crap Cleaner at the default settings, this will remove all the excess files and fragments of programs left by untidy uninstallers from all over your computer. Install AVG anti virus, AVG anti spyware, AdAware and Zonealarm. Allow each to do a full scan while still disconnected from the internet and allow Zonalarm to start. Then re-connect your internet connection and open each of these programs and get the latest updates. Then run the full scan with each again. Then visit Microsoft for all the Windows updates you are missing, I asume you have WindowsXP? Now Neal, if you are fearful of any of this say so and hopefully another poster will come along and tell you that what I have suggested will work - or disagree and tell you different things to try. There is nothing in this message to harm your computer.

Cast iron is excellent! There is no reason you cannot use it on electric. Although I have a gas stove, and prefer cooking on it, I have used all of my cast iron cookware on electric as well. There's just a tad more learning curve with electric, and a smooth surface would require you to be careful so as not to damage your stovetop. You can also take cast iron camping and cook over wood or charcoal with them. Take care to season your cast iron and care for it, and you'll get a lifetime of use from it. Enameled cast iron such as LC and Staub are also excellent. I have a lot of cast iron cookware from Lodge Manufacturing (made in the USA) from skillets, to griddles, to bread pans. My eggs slide right out of the pans, and I now cook pancakes on my round griddles because I didn't want to use nonstick electric griddles any more. I had a slight learning curve as to what burner settings to use initially for best results, but I would never go back to all the junky small appliances now. I use low to medium settings for most things. High heat setting when frying potatoes. If you decide to try a cast iron pan for eggs, make sure to use enough butter initially with it until the pan becomes well seasoned. Contrary to what all the "studies" show, real butter is very healthy for you, and I have lost weight without trying after starting to use enough butter to make things taste good. You'll have the pan forever.