Win7 safe mode problem

Hello, I appreciate everyone taking the time to read this and (hopefully) help me. I use an Acer laptop with 32bit win7 home. Recently my cpu fan has begun to fail and while a new one is en route my comp has crashed on me a couple times to prevent overheating. That's not really a problem (well its not "the" problem). This last time (a few hours ago) I selected normal mode as it booted back up (as I always do since I'm aware of the issue and that only a new fan will solve it) yet safe mode was launched. So, while scratching my head, I manually restarted and safe mode persisted. I restored to my last update point and rebooted: safe mode.

In msconfig, I deselected safe boot (under boot tab) but noticed under general tab that selective startup had been selected minus the original boot config option. I selected this which in turn reselected safe boot back under the boot tab. So I go under general again and select normal startup (the top option) but that also reselected safe boot. So now I have selective start-up with services and startup items. So far I've been able to run everything as usual (except the files and data loading screen during reboot and the giant safe-mode resolution at log-in) but I'm still very curious why this is happening.

This might help explain what I mean:

Thank you! You are a lifesaver my friend! I clicked it once but cancelled it because of the ominous "you have chosen to commit..." warning that popped up. Again, thank you for the advice.