Any ideas on why my computer mouse would freeze on me?

Have you tried plugging the mouse back in? If it is USB you can do it while the computer is on. And try a different USB port. The one you are using could be having problems.

Freezing up is possibly caused by many different things. It could be the mouse itself, or its driver (wouldn’t that be nice)

More likely it is one of the programs you are running that is caught in a loop, using all the system resources, and preventing other things (like the mouse) from running.

If the keyboard still works, use CTL-ALT-Delete to open the task manager and see what is running. Look for high CPU usage. This may give a clue.

If you can’t do that, start a journal. Every time this happens, write in the journal what programs were open and what you were doing at the time of the freeze. See if you can identify a common element that is the likely culprit.

Usually this is the defensive response to a predator encountered in the wild.

Start with something simple. Is it the kind that has a ball in it? If it does, take it out & clean it. It may just be dirty. I’ve had to do that to mine before. just a thought

Thank you all! I’ve taken out the ball to clean it but not yet tried switching the USB port, I’ll try that tomorrow. When I do open the CTL-ALT-Delete, it does give me a list of all windows running but I don’t know what to do with that info, I don’t even know which keys to use to close each program but will try to troubleshoot with you all again. :D

Good luck with it. There’s nothing more frustrating than something that just quits working like that.

Have you tried talking nice to it?

@AstroChuck: Yes, I murr murred sweetly to it, even went as far as rubbing it under my shirt.

It’s very cold?

Scan for viruses and malware. I’m sure you have an anti-virus program.. Run it. Malware Bytes is good and free for the malware.