You have to get rid of the anti-virus element of McAfee if you are using the suite including firewall. That would normally mean complete uninstall (add remove programs) reboot and custom install excluding the anti-virus element.
Or you could uninstall completely and choose another firewall, comodo (however you don’t say what your OS is and I don’t know if comodo firewall is vista compatible).
There is also a tool to remove McAfee which you should probably run after uninstalling. McAfee uninstall tool that you could run to ensure any possible remnants are removed.
http://download.mcafee.com/products/licensed/cust_support_patches/VSCleanupTool.exe
With regard to the email make sure your firewall allows ashMaiSv.exe internet access.