i use firefox and adblock plus, no problems. i think there's an adblock plus for ie also. also clearing out your cache, history, and cookies once a month might help. general maintenance, such as disk cleanup, and defrag will help. like Mike said, use an antivirus and anti spyware. i use avira and malwarebytes. both are free and don't eat up your resources or slow your computer down like norton, mcafee, and the other big company programs.

firefox is on a very fast track in new versions blazing fast in fact. Just read a good article on it. So we can all get used to the new versions coming in very quickly. Firefox 7 is already in alpha and is expected to go to public beta on August 16 around which time Firefox 8 will go to alpha and Version 6 will be officially released. doing these quick updates really mess with the add-ons authors as they try to keep up with the speed of the changes in the new versions. So that leaves us with some of our fave add-ons not working while their authors scramble to keep up. I tend to stick with the version that all my add-ons work with till I am sure which ever new version also has working add ons then I move on.

kren...thanks so much...I'm hoping egg is a moisturizing agent and will make me age beautifully through this remodel! :) I don't know how it happened but I am gifted at caulking....it just goes on perfect...I think it's all in the cut of the tip and the continuous flow...no bumps as you pull it across! :) I know I must look silly while doing it, but it goes on like butter! :) Susan, I told him I appreciated his experience...but I did not come here to ask for a professional to restate exactly what I had already stated...just no need in it and while I may be an expert in other fields if someone is asking for help and I really don't have any I don't go restating the problem...he could have easily told me about a caulk that has special additives to prevent mold...never knew about those because I've never dealt with tub surrounds before...that would have been helpful..or he could have recommened a top notch sealer as mentioned below in comments I found on John Bridge's site...these people tried to help and I appreciate that...I just don't see any help in restating the problem...I think I did that well enough. I just won't accept there is nothing to do when it's been done time and time again and the Mapei mastic says it can be used in wet areas except where there is standing water like a shower pan floor...so I did some more researching...and here is some good info for anyone else in my situation..I won't be the last I'm sure..and I'd like to see someone get more help when they go looking..this one deals with a shower surround which to me is much more a risk than a tub surround that is used for baths...my girls don't like showering in a tub... Seriously, mastic can be made to work in a shower. Mastic simply cannot be allowed to remain wet. If it does, it re-emulsifies and the tiles come off. Keep the shower dry and the grout well sealed, and you can delay that for a long time. Also, bear in mind that the bottom 2 feet of the shower are the most at risk. You could reset those, or wait for the problem to emerge, then reset them. I wouldn't tear is down just because it might not last as long as real thinset. It could easily last for a long time. I tear out older mastic showers all the time that are still sound, only the homeowner wanted a different look. You may be a lot older when it needs to be re-done, and you may want a different look by then. Also, I tore out a 15 year old tub shower a few weeks ago that was set with Mapei Mastic.Other than the fact that the grout was milewing due to no vapor barrier,this thing was perfect.The Mastics have been improved even more since then. klark I think squeegin' is good, but IMHO sealing the grout is much more important. You can almost (almost) completely seal out water with a good sealer if you maintain it on a regualr basis. With a little diligence I think you can make that shower last as long as you are in the house. First off,be absolutly Thankful that it was a Mapei product you used and not something else. I have used many Pallets of Mapei Mastic commercially and it is the best out there bar none ,no exceptions!! All those help me...I don't mind being diligent with sealer..so I'm off to find a better product for sealing and will diligently keep it applied...to me that's much easier than redoing the tile..my back can't handle it and my bank account is handling two mortgages right now...so a $5 bottle of sealer a couple times a year will do me just fine.. Tara

Bravo! Very happy to hear your machine is working! I can understand having a 3, 5 and 7 year old ourselves that the laundry piles up FAST! I would suspect the F-27 error is due to over suds error. The hotter that water, the more suds are produced. The smallest amount of detergent produces suds like crazy on sanitary cycle. I have found Tide HE to be very sudsy as it is. I have given up on HE liquids all together. If you have soft water, you may want to give HE powders a try. I find powder to be less sudsy more so on hotter temps and rinses cleaner all together. The target to shoot for is a FEW suds/bubbles being splashed onto the window. In a HE front load machine, too many suds results in reduced cleaning performance, all the water is used up to make suds and there is no water left to actually clean the clothes. When I used liquid, I would get a pitcher of hot water, and a table spoon of liquid at a time followed by flushing it into the machine with hot water from the pitcher into the machine. So I would put 2 tablespoons into the dispenser then start the machine, once the machine had filled on it's own, I would watch the suds. No suds yet? Add another table spoon of liquid flushed with some hot water from the pitcher. It could get a little tricky using the Sanitary cycle, because as the machine heated the water hotter, more suds were produced. There is a learning curve with HE front loaders, learning how to not over suds the machine, while still using enough detergent to get clean clothes. Having 3 young children, almost all their clothes have been washed on sanitary on a regular basis. The biggest thing I had to get my brain around was that SUDS does not equal cleaning power. I had to get used to seeing very little to no suds and trusting that the clothes were getting clean. Worst thing that could happen is I had to re-run the load with more detergent, and chalk it up to a test run. I have been using home made laundry soap the past few months and find it works better than anything store bought, and produces very little suds and is very forgiving for over dosing the machine. I have tried pretty much every liquid and powder on the market both HE and non-HE. As far as claims for HE detergent (both liquid and powder) producing less suds, I have not found that to be the case. I found no difference in suds or cleaning power between for example Tide HE powder or normal regular every day Tide. Remember that all detergent manufacturers want you to use as much detergent as possible. Half or less of what they tell you to use usually does the job. Have been eying up the Maytag 3000 series in Crimson red as a replacement for our 6.5 year old Whirlpool Duet HT which is getting a little tired after 10+ loads a week for 6.5 years.