Work has been totally clobbered this week by a major outbreak of the Conficker-A worm. It got hold of some valid Windows Domain credentials and wreaked havoc. I was at the office until nine tonight, and we’re nowhere near the end of dealing with this mess. The XP desktops were relatively easy to take care of — get rid of server service, run the removal tool, then enable Automatic Updates. The Windows 2003 servers were much tougher to clean up, because DHCP client and RPC were clobbered. I’m sure you’re fascinated by this. But I had to leave the fun tonight because I promised Bismo I’d meet him at a bar, where a couple of other guys from work were playing in a band with a buddy of theirs.
Speaking of getting clobbered, Bismo and I found ourselves as reluctant participants in a bar brawl! By the time the pile of lunkhead steroid users plowed into us, the two guys who were actually throwing punches were being held down by others, so for me it was only a matter of pushing back, which was surprisingly easy to do. But there was no avoiding becoming involved. The fight broke up, but only temporarily, when the two antagonists started going at it again, apparently at the urging of some woman who either looks older than she is, or is trying to look younger than she is. Once things heated up again, the cops were called, and before they arrived the troublemakers cleared out.