Fried & True by Fay Jacobs

and cat fights and that was just me and Bonnie. Bodily functions were involved, which Ihasten to add did not originate with me and Bonnie.
    I read the story. People laughed.
    The reading went well, the signing went well thanks to Pam’s name game, Anyda and Muriel watched it all with glee and we sold a heck of a lot of books.
    Whooo Hooo.
    Afterwards, Anyda and Muriel and dozens of our friends, young, old and in-between gathered on Laurel Street, in the house and on the porch, to raise a glass to A&M Books. The publishers glowed.
    Sweet.
    Well that was fun. How long will the other several thousand books stay in my garage before they get hauled off to Mt. Trashmore?

June 2004
    LETTERS FROM CAMP REHOBOTH
    THE SPYWARE THAT SHAGGED ME
    Now I’m being spied on. And not by Attorney General John Ashcroft, who I would expect to do so. No, I’m being spied on by my own household computer. Although Ashcroft may have my file on his desk as well.
    Is this what being published brings? Is it the result of my name and the word lesbian being inexorably linked in some Google algorithm? Or maybe it’s random. Or maybe it’s not.
    Now before you call me completely paranoid, I have to tell you that this was NOT to be my topic for this column.
    In fact, I was surfing the net for confirmation about a factoid I wrote about Cicadas—those beady-eyed disgusting shrimp-sized bugs that have descended on the D.C. metro area in recent weeks.
    I was set to tell you that there are about a million reasons why I love that I moved to the beach, but right up there, especially this month, is that I missed the attack of the 17-year locusts. I’m delighted that the vermin don’t cross the Chesapeake Bay and invade Delmarva.
    Truth is, I was going to relate my run-ins with the swarm of Brood X Cicadas (not to be confused with Generation X, which swarms in our local watering holes) that came out in both 1987 and way back in 1970. Point of fact, I came out in 1980, having nothing to do with locusts. But those tales will have to wait.
    A funny thing happened on my way to the Cicada story. My computer was invaded by spyware. I went to Google to search for Cicadas and I got an eyeful of pop-up ads, followed by strange grinding noises from my hard drive and then my computer went on a slow-down strike. I could eat my dinner, and in fact, did, while waiting for Google to do a search. I came back and tried to get my e-mail but the machine worked like it had swallowed a fistful of Quaaludes.
    When the thing worked at all it was with pop-up ads for casinos, prescriptions by mail, liposuction clinics, and methods of enlarging an organ I do not have.
    â€œYou have just won!!!!” “Get the drugs you need!” “Sweepstakes Winner!!!” and my favorite, “Be Bigger and she’ll love you!” Boy, are they barking up the wrong tree house.
    I tried to close the ads and the computer froze up like a lesbian in a room full of Promise Keepers. Did this have something to do with the wireless cable doodad under my desk that’s been blinking at me ever since I threw over dial-up for broadband?
    â€œHello, Comcast? My computer pops up then poops out.”
    â€œHmmmm. It sounds like spyware has invaded your system.”
    Do I call Bond. James Bond? Do I go to the C.I.A.? Ghostbusters?
    The tech support guru explained that my computer had a bad case of this spyware phenomenon. It’s not a virus or a worm, mind you, but software that watches what you are doing and zaps you with ads against your will. I’d rather have a virus. This feels more like a rapist.
    How the hell did this happen?
    â€œI have no idea,” said techguy, “but it happens a lot.”
    â€œBut my machine was fine yesterday.”
    â€œYeah, it can happen in a minute. One click, one piece of spam, you never know.”
    Then he told me to go to Download.com and find a free software called Spybot, download it and run the program on my