Hard Lesson Learned

After settling back into writer mode after my foray to the north to visit my daughter, her husband and the three young'uns, I found myself in a dilemma. A bad one. My trusty laptop, the machine I carry with me everywhere--Florida, Michigan, Alaska, Kentucky, Mississipppi--has died. I have a nice new one now, thanks to the knowledge and generosity of my daughter and son-in-law, and I love it. But I need some things that are still encased in the hard drive of my old computer and it simply refuses to boot up. Although I have those documents (supposedly) on a thumb drive, I can't seem to get it to open up and transfer to the new computer. So I'm resigned to being plagued with computer problems until my old one is somehow cured long enough for me to retrieve my things or someone figures out what to do with this reluctant thumb drive. That could be tomorrow or it could be five years from now. Let's hope it's somewhere between those two extremes.

I learned a very valuable lesson, though. I need to back up absolutely everything I write--every single day. I've heard the warnings, commiserated with those who have had similar problems, and thought about what would happen if that fate befell me... well, it has. And just thinking about backing up documents isn't good enough. I have to do it. Often.

Not all is lost, though. I know there's someone out there who can tease that information out of my laptop and I do have the majority of my work safely settled onto the hard drive of my new machine, thanks to a CD I burned a few months ago. If anyone reads this, I hope my disaster will serve not only as a hard lesson for me, but as a warning for others.

Until the next time...