Bless You, MajorGeeks (illegal operation)

I'm mystified, as usual. I had an outbreak of the dreaded "Illegal Operation" messages that began yesterday morning ... and mysteriously ended this afternoon. The messages popped up concerning all sorts of activities--including Internet Explorer, IncrediMail, ZoneAlarm. I tried everything I know--virus scan with Avast, scans with Ad-Aware and Spyware Blaster--and nothing showed or helped. Of course, I couldn't get a web page to load, so I couldn't House Call. And I don't have Hijack This--but I soon will have it. Things still were messed up this morning. This afternoon, I gave it another try and viola! Everything seems to be okay. Why? I haven't the foggiest!
Now for the reason for the "blessing": Once I was able to get up web pages, I went directly to MajorGeeks and did a search for "Illegal Operation." What a wealth of info is there! Thanks to Boccemon for the answers to Agahnim; thanks for Kodo's pointer to MajorAttitude's stuff on removing spyware, trojans and viruses. Thanks to MA for that stuff. And thanks to all the others who answered the various questions about Illegal Operation.
Although I don't know why my system is working okay now, I sure know more things do in hopes of preventing a recurrance of that particular problem, and more things to try if there is a recurrance.
Thanks, thanks, thanks to MajorGeeks.

 

Thank you for taking the time to start this thread. Alot of members here spend hours and days trying to help people and I am sure they appreciate the kind words.

Thank you very much, from all of us.

Steve

 

Thanks!!