VSMON.exe is using tons of RAM. How to stop it?

My computer has been running slow for a few months now. My virus stuff is kept up to date, and I'm pretty smart about not getting into bad situations.

Now, I usually run several programs at once, and I like to keep my Task Manager handy to see what's using the most memory, so I can shut down when things get hairy.

In other words, I have a pretty good idea of what's supposed to be running at the tens of thousands of kilobytes and what should just be in the thousands.

In recent months, a program called VSMON.exe has been running at insane levels. It might run at 12,000 kb but sometimes will work its way up to 60,000+!

At these higher levels, it dramatically slows down my machine.

When I right-click on VSMON.exe in the task manager and select End Process, I get an error saying Access is Denied. In other words, I can't shut it down.

The only reference to VSMON.exe I can find on my computer is one which points to Zone Labs, which I don't use, and have not used in a couple years at least, far as I know.

My computer has the following specs:

WinXP fully updated
1 Gig RAM
180 Meg HD
Athlon processor

Can you tell me how to get rid of this VSMON.exe or make it behave? If I delete the program, what other programs might be affected?

Thanks,

General Tsao