I just ran into this same problem. Running drew's steps, including the .14 kernel, fixed it:
His workaround:
1. Reboot. (my machine didn't shutdown clearly and had to be powered off)
2. At grub menu choose kernel 2.6.22-14 (not 2.6.22-15)
3. Once booted run dpkg --configure -a
4. wait (it takes a while)
5. Reboot
I just ran into this same problem. Running drew's steps, including the .14 kernel, fixed it:
His workaround:
1. Reboot. (my machine didn't shutdown clearly and had to be powered off)
2. At grub menu choose kernel 2.6.22-14 (not 2.6.22-15)
3. Once booted run dpkg --configure -a
4. wait (it takes a while)
5. Reboot