gnome `recovery' after accidental shutdown

[Miles Bader <miles@lsi.nec.co.jp>]

I accidentally turned off my machine (after it had been idle all night),
but figured, no big deal, ext3 &c can handle it.  However the problem
seems to be gnome.

After booting, when I logged in from gdm, I first got an error from
`gconf' than it couldn't lock this file:

   ~/.gconf/%gconf-xml-backend.lock/ior

Hitting `OK' just went back to gdm, and logging again yielded the same
result.  Judging from the name, I figured it was just a lock file, and
could be removed, so I removed it and tried logging it again.  Whoops.

Now it gives me a different error upon startup and displays a default
configuration, none of my panels, background, anything.  Here's the
error dialog that pops up (it actually pops up a bunch of times, and I
hit the `Details' button to get the cryptic sounding messages).

   An error occurred while loading or saving configuration information for gnome-panel. Some of your configuration settings may not work properly.

   Adding client to server's list failed, CORBA error: IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0
   Adding client to server's list failed, CORBA error: IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0
   Adding client to server's list failed, CORBA error: IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0
   ...

So:

   (1) Can anyone suggest a way for me to get back to normal?

   (2) Is Gnome's error recovery really this bad, or is something wrong
       with my setup?

Thanks,

-Miles
-- 
`Cars give people wonderful freedom and increase their opportunities.
 But they also destroy the environment, to an extent so drastic that
 they kill all social life' (from _A Pattern Language_)