Sony VAIO Windows 7 keyboard goes into strange state on fumbled keystrokes

Here's a way to recover from the keyboard being stuck without losing everything:

  1. Use CTL + ALT + DEL (if it still works, or you can use the mouse and the start menu) to get to the logout/change user menu
  2. Change user to yourself

This resets the keyboard, while retaining your the running programs. You don't lose anything except your temper.

This is not a cure to that prevents the keyboard from sticking, so I'm not marking this as the accepted answer.