So…late Friday afternoon I’m finishing up a novella — that is coincidentally DUE that evening — and four lines to go — I mean, literally FOUR lines to go — my computer crashes.
Blue screen, large white font spelling disaster in no uncertain terms and in type large enough to be suitable for reading by idiots. And of course I have a moment of panic where my heart starts pounding and sweat breaks out on my forehead and I envision a future laid to waste by nuclear weapons…and then I calm myself down and reboot, reminding myself that it’s probably okay because this has happened twice before in the history of this particular laptop, and it’s always been okay…
Please God…please please please…
And, Lo! Yes my system comes back up…and promptly crashes again…and again and again and again. I can’t get it back. Once I get all the way to the desktop and I see that my files are sitting there…maybe they’re okay because this is a good sign that I can get to my desktop, right?
But the computer continues to crash. I try rebooting in safe mode, I try setting a system restore point, I try going in as another user. No. No. NO.
I have a flash drive. In fact, I have two flash drives and an external floppy drive, courtesy of Mr. Thrilling, but it’s a week since I used them. A week and several thousand words on three different projects later.
And that is a lot of time and a lot of words.
And as I sit here typing at my sister’s house on my sister’s PC, I am wondering…why?
Not: why me, not why did my laptop crash, but why was I so stupid as to not back everything up? It’s not like I haven’t heard the horror stories — or believed them — it’s not like I didn’t realize ahead of time what a disaster this would be — I’m both imaginative and fearful, I knew this would be just as bad as it is — so why did I take that risk?
And since I am now at the philosophical stage of waiting on my rooftop for the men in row boats to come and rescue me, I wonder why all of us take these stupid little pointless risks day in and day out?
I’m pretty sure it’s not just me.
I mean, I understand the taking of big risks, the calculated, putting-all-my-money-on-lucky-number-seven gambles. That’s part of being alive, isn’t it?
But the stupid, pointless risks — the running of red lights when there’s nothing really at stake. No one’s giving birth in the back of the SUV, no one’s being transported to safety, foreign spies are not in pursuit…so why do we all take these little chances?
By the way, running red — or even amber — lights is not one of my little bad habitual risk-takings, but gambling with the entire body of my written word (my work place, in other words) apparently is.
And what is up with that? Why do we do it? Why do we take little chances with the things that have huge consequences? Why do we — humans, I mean, not me in particular — engage in everything from unprotected sex to uninsured homes? Even when we’re old enough to know better?
Oh, while I’m thinking of it, go back up your computer — and go get a Tetanus shot. You’re probably way overdue.
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Oh. My. God. I so hope you found what seemed to disappear into the ether. I’m terrible about saving.
I just saved my WIP on my zip drive, on my hard drive, e-mailed it to my husband and myself.
Thanks for the warning/reminder. And hey, let me add another one to go along with your tetanus shot suggestion. Ladies, get your mammograms.
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I’ll know tomorrow when the Geek Squad guy arrives. Apparently Friday night is a really bad time to have a hard drive meltdown — weekends aren’t good either!
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Oh, Diana. The agony! I hope you get all your words back. I have no idea why I don’t always back everything up. Laziness? Too busy? Of course if I lose everything I’ll be even further behind.
And since we seem to have medical sub-theme going here–which is worse: backing up your hard-drive or getting a flu shot?
by Sara
on September 24th, 2007 at 1:11 pm
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Sara, it’s crazy, isn’t it? It only takes a few minutes and the pain and time it saves — I’m speaking of backing up, not flu shots. I’ve never had a flu shot!
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Ack!!! *hugs* I automatically back up to my external drive once a week. I have sudden urge to do it more often now…
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Also, buy a Mac.
It’s worth the extra money to not have hard drive issues up the wazoo. I’m working on a 3.5 year-old iBook and never once have crashed. I once accidentally deleted some work, so I still back up my novel files, but…
Buy a Mac.
//end push
by Eliza
on September 24th, 2007 at 2:27 pm
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Mine’s too large for home-use backup devices, so I don’t. I do run a check each week to see if anything is starting to fail, and if I find one I take the drive out, put it into another machine that is minimally loaded and copy the data off it.
Now, I am not a writer - instead I have a ton of music and video which takes up space galore. The one machine that I care about has 8 drives in it - 3 @ 300 gog, 3 @ 250 Gig, one at 160 gig and one at 120 gig, so even with my largest zip drive it would take no less than around 200 or so disks to back it up- not to mention a few weeks.
If I thought the Minister of Finance at our house would stand for it, I’d get a large fast couple of SCSI drives and use tapes, but that tends to be oretty pricey.
I do, however, move everything new to the Media Center machine on a daily basis, discarding that which I really don’t care about.
I’m not going to tell you that I have never lost anything, but I will tell you that what I have lost usually was because of something I did and not a piece of hardware going poof!
For writers, I would think a Zip-750 would be a great thing to have, or at least a Zip-250 - and it should be used every day before shutting down - and whenever you get up for more coffee.
All that having been said, I just bought a 500 gig external drive (and I saw a 1000 gig [or a 1 t] drive over the weekend for under $300) - but can’t make up my mind yet what’s important enough to copy over there. USB drivers are getting so cheap it is silly not to have one.
bob
by Bob
on September 24th, 2007 at 2:35 pm
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Eliza, the Macs use the same drive manufacturers as the Windoze machines. You’ve been fortunate, although the MAC O/S does tend to be less farught with crap code than WinDoze….
by Bob
on September 24th, 2007 at 2:43 pm
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Did Mr. Thrilling have to resort to smelling salts?
I can only imagine. Which is why I’m backing up NOW.
Hugs.
by Laura
on September 24th, 2007 at 4:06 pm
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Thanks, Tori. Depending on how much you write, a week can be way too little too late.  ops:
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Thanks for the thought, Eliza. These were also the words of wisdom from Mr. Thrilling and my brother-in-law. I actually prefer Windows to Mac, and have never had this kind of disaster strike before…
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Whoa, Bob! I keep picturing that giant computer in the movie DESKSET. If I’d just used my trusty little flash drive…as you say, just popping it in when I got up for another gallon of green tea….
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Mr. Thrilling was appropriately moved and sympathetic, Laura — and he refrained from mentioning those under-utilized flash drives more than three times. Which was lucky for him, because one more mention of flash drives and I probably would have run amuck. It was a near thing as it was.
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WOW, coincidence? I just lost 2,000 words in my 2nd novel on a flish drive that got left in a golf cart.
Don’t ask why I had my flash drive with my latest work at a golf course. And, of course, nobody turned it in.
I work on two different laptops, so I tend to use flash drives. I back up my work almost nightly on my flash drives, to my hard drive on my laptop and desktop. Then I do weekly backups to my external hard drive. I have my computers all networked, so its not time consuming.
Oh, roughly monthly, I back up a few files to my Website hosting company.
I feel for you Diana.
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Two thousand words! Ouch, Will!
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Ack! I’m sorry to hear about that, Diana, and I hope you can recover everything. My harddrive died this time last year, and now I back up everything important. In fact, I’d just finished working for the night and backing up when I read this. Thanks for the reminder though. If I hadn’t remembered tonight, this would have kicked me in the butt.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed for you, and sending positive thoughts your way.
And, OMG, Will. That totally stinks. I can’t believe no one would’ve turned it in if they found it. Maybe tomorrow they’ll find it.
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Diana — the new MacBooks run Windows, and they do it a lot more smoothly. Just sayin’  Your husband does care for you, he wants your words to be safe and happy in their home!
Bob — My husband and I have been able to convince three sisters and three friends to buy Macs, and except for a weird iPhoto corrupted file issue a year and a half ago, they’ve had no problems in the time they’ve owned theirs. So if I’m lucky, we’re all lucky.
My husband tends to run his PowerBook into the ground, since he’s a musician and producer and at work a tech advisor, so he’s had two hard drive issues, but the AppleCare has taken care of those problems without any hassle. Even if Apple is destroying my hearing with The iPod Earbuds of Doom, I have to point at what works. Maybe someday I’ll learn Linux and toss away shiny logo, but until then…
by Eliza
on September 25th, 2007 at 6:14 am
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Hey, Eliza, options are good! I’m keepig an open mind in case the Geek Squad guy tells me the words I most fear. (No, no, not the Hmm-you-look-fat words, the OTHER words.)
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Hey, thanks, BE. I’ve learned my lesson, that’s for sure. Talk about preventable panic. No levees were involved in the making of this disaster…
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I lost 45 pages once. The computer didn’t shut down, I didn’t do anything wrong… the words just disappeared. Poof! One day they were there, the next morning they weren’t. Words I had been writing for a week, saving every night, opening every morning… they’d always been there, but one morning it was as if the computer had reset itself for Thursday a week ago. I had all sorts of fits and never did get what I lost back. I went out the next day and got a new computer, and I will never, ever, EVER use WordPerfect again!
by JennieB
on September 26th, 2007 at 7:58 am
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Oh, Jennie! That’s terrible — in fact, it’s even worse because you did everything right.
The Geek Squad guy says — and is now corroborated by the message on my laptop HARD DRIVE FAILURE EMINENT!!!
So I’m looking at new laptops. You’d think the promise of shopping would thrill me, but…
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