Paranoia

So my mom came to visit last week. As you know, she’s wacky. Last week Elizabeth and a friend discovered things on the internet that children shouldn’t discover.

The very evening of the discovery I turned on the parental controls on my PC as a stop gap. But I wanted to do more. I planned on setting up user accounts and passwords and making things much more secure.

I told my mom about Elizabeth’s misadventures and my plans for reconfiguring my computer. But I didn’t get to it right away. I had house guests.

On Saturday I found a few free minutes for myself and I started to set up my computer the way I wanted. I created a password-less account for Elizabeth called “Elizabeth.” I activated the default “Guest” account that comes with Windows for my mom. She hadn’t asked if she could use my computer, but I knew she was using it to check email and stuff. I also put a password on the administrator account which I planned to use as my regular work space. I spent some time messing around with permissions and set-up and then I went to bed.

Sunday morning I find my mom using my computer. When she heard my footsteps she turned around and snarled at me. She was clearly very angry with me. We had the following conversation:

Mom: I used YOUR account to check my email.

Me: My account? How did you get the password?

Mom: There wasn’t a password. Password?

Me: Oh you must have used Elizabeth’s account. I go by Liz now, remember. Besides, I put a password on the administrator account.

Mom: A password? What are you trying to hide from me? Why don’t you want me to use your computer? That’s not nice and you’re making me feel like you don’t love me.

Me: Mom, I told you about Elizabeth’s little adventures…

Mom: Oh yeah.