Oh mom.......

Oh boy, trying to help my mom with a computer issue.......sorry, it's not happening. I honestly just cannot even understand what she is trying to tell me! it's literally "I open that Firefox thing and then I see something about "s-y-m - symatic or something. I can't get to my aol or anything. Over on the left is usually that one thing, you know? but now I can't find it". Good lord, I honestly have zero idea what she is talking about. I asked her if she's tried turning off her computer and turning it back on? (always a good thing to try first) Her reply was something like " well, ya, but (and then she's trying to explain something else about it" Mom - did you actually shut off your computer? "yes, I did and you know that little button on the front, well I did that but....(and then she totally made no sense)".  "Norton keeps coming up".  Me: oh you put Norton on again? (I had advised her not too). apparently she did. I recommended she would probably be just best to take her computer in somewhere (this is the new computer I went with her to buy and set it up for her not too long ago) and have them take a look at what is going on. Other than uninstalling Norton (which I know she wouldn't know how to do), I don't know how to fix, nor do I really understand what the problem even is.

Then she says "what do I take in to them? just that box under my desk?" Umm.....didn't we buy you an "all-in-one" computer, where your computer unit is built into your monitor? "Oh, maybe we did". I think what's under your desk is your modem.  "oh, it says Comcast on it". Right, you don't need to take that to the computer shop, that isn't part of your computer. Just take the monitor unit that is on your desk.

Today she calls me before she's getting ready to take it in...."will they need the password? is it the password you set up to do my taxes?" WHAT?! LOL. No, mom, that password doesn't have anything to do with running your computer.  I know she always turns her computer off each night....do you have to put in a password each time you turn on your computer? (I didn't remember doing this when I set her up). First she said yes, then she said no.  She has no idea. "well, my password for AOL is already in there". No, mom, that is not the same thing.  Mom - when you turn your computer on each morning, do you have to put in a password before anything (meaning desktop, but I knew she wouldn't know what that was) will even show up on your computer? She honestly doesn't know! "I guess I'll bring my list of passwords with me just in case"  (which is literally a bunch of slips of paper with partial info on them that drive me INSANE) "But I can still see my AOL mail and facebook on my ipad mini..that's weird". Well, mom, the ipad doesn't have anything to do with your desktop computer.....

Sigh....I wish I could help her and I wish I could understand her explanations that make no sense and bounce around all over the place. I probably should have set up something like TeamViewer on her computer before I moved so I could log into her computer and try to see what is going on, but she'd have no idea how to even open it anyway to let me get logged in. She really does like 3 things on her computer. Goes to the internet to see her aol mail, her Facebook (don't even get me started trying to explain that to her! "why do I keep seeing so and so's stuff?" umm...because you are friends with them...."well, how do I get rid of it?" You don't,unless you unfriend them. As peoples new posts show up, the old posts fall away below them, etc etc.), and her banking with her bank and her investment company. That's it. Oh, and she plays solitaire. So, I installed AVG just so she'd have some virus protection in the background and added Firefox and put her 4 websites she goes to as favorites showing on the top bar. So, all she would have to do is turn on her computer. Click on Firefox, and then she could go to her 4 spots. It should have been pretty fail-safe, right?

Hopefully the computer repair shop can fix her up and she doesn't have to pay too much.