Raman, thank you, sir, for your advice!
I installed and ran spybot and deleted some nasty stuff--although it's in a safe place in case I goofed 
I checked for disk erorrs, defraged. and empytied the cache...in other words, I cleaned up as much as I knew how to do.
Also, when I did a through scan this time, I marked repair all...I'll scan again later and see if CTX is still there.
When I hover over the avast! icon--activated manually--it says: on access scanner 6 provider(s) total 5 running...is this something that I need to correct??
Cojo, what were the result of the scanning?
For your question,
on access scanner 6 provider(s) total 5 running..., this means one of the six avast! modules (resident providers) is not running. It's not wrong but, could you see is avast! is correctly configurated for your need? Right click the 'a' icon, choose, 'On-Access Protection Control'.
The six residents providers are:
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Standard Shield. It checks the applications being run and documents being opened. It will not allow an infected application to start or an infected document to be opened, thus possibly protecting you, the user from activating/spreading a virus
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Outlook/Exchange. It checks incoming and outgoing e-mail messages processed by MS Outlook client (it is part of the MS Office package - it is not the same as the simpler Outlook Express!) or MS Exchange. It will refuse to accept or send a message containing a viral code
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Internet Mail. It checks incoming and outgoing e-mail messages processed by clients other than MS Outlook or Exchange, such as Outlook Express, Eudora etc. Again, it will refuse to accept or send a message containing a viral code
Profession Edition includes also:-
Script blocking. It checks scripts contained in the web pages you look at, thus avoiding infection due to potential bugs in your web browser
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Instant Messaging. It checks the files downloaded by common communication programs, such as ICQ or MSN Messenger
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P2P Shield. It checks the files downloaded by common P2P (file sharing) programs, such as Kazaa and others
Which one is disabled?
