Black Barcode Notification Area

[Routhinator]

Good day people, just installed Xubuntu 9.10 on a Compaq Evo N610c laptop. I have an issue with the notification area showing up as a black barcode square when there are no notifications.. moving the mouse over it makes it disappear, however I'd like to correct this. I can't figure out a search to lead me to the right answer, anyone point me in the right direction? Here's the screenshot:

[koleoptero]

You can replace ubuntu's notification system with xfce's one by installing the xfce4-notifyd package. It's not exactly a solution but it's one of the first things I do when I install xubuntu because it's more configurable (you can then select the corner the notifications appear and even theme from the Settings > Notifications menu).