windows explorer issues.. at my wit's end

Archived from groups: microsoft.public.windowsxp.help_and_support (More info?)

So, i get home today and start using my computer, when low and behold,
windows explorer (and my toolbars, desktop icons etc) decide to
disappear. Not one to be disturbed by such a simple occurance, i open
taskmanager and go to processes. Sure enough, explorer.exe isnt
running, so i run a new task and attempt to start it back up. nothing
happens, even after trying several times. Once or twice it even popped
up for a second before quickly closing. I've tried restarts, system
restores, virus and spyware scans (no viruses etc were reported,) and
nothing. Explorer starts up just fine in safe mode, but still nada when
running windows normally. I can not for the life of me figure out what
just happened to my computer, and at the moment am only capable of
using it by starting everything through the task manager. Any help with
this perplexing problem would be most appreciated.


--
oracular