Mamas On The Web

My first two easily avoidable mistakes

October 2nd, 2008

I mentioned in yesterday’s post that I was going to talk about some of the mistakes I’ve made in the past two months and how I plan to avoid them next time around. I’ve made quite a few mistakes, let me tell you, so I’ll only talk about a couple of them in this particular post.

My first mistake was not packing up my computer and notebooks before I left for my trip to British Columbia. I was in a rush to get going so the thought never crossed my mind. I did manage to grab my laptop, but that slow-ass hunk o’ junk is ancient and takes forever to load a simple program and it doesn’t have an Internet connection. So after I came back to my grandma’s, I decided to rectify one of those problems.

Wee! Off to the dollar store I ran and picked up a few funky little notebooks to write down some new ideas. Not having my computer was painful, but you can’t exactly buy a new computer at the dollar store - and if you could it probably wouldn’t be a smart business investment - but at least I had me some cool new notebooks to play with.

By the way, if you use good old paper and pen for taking notes, brainstorming, or writing down your plans, schedules, to-do lists, etc., then the dollar stores are great places to pick up notebooks. I bought them in all different colors - one for each blog - and labeled them accordingly. Much cheaper than stationary or big box stores.

After a few weeks of staying at my grandma’s, I couldn’t stand it anymore so I jumped in my car and drove an hour back to my house so I could dig through my crap and get my computer. Everything in my entire house was all cramped together in two rooms, and of course my computer was closer to the bottom of the pile.

When I finally finished the excavation, I had my computer and a bunch of random cords which I hoped were the computer cords. After getting back to my grandma’s, I had it all hooked up and working, thanking my lucky stars that I grabbed the right stuff.

When my floor was being ripped up, an inch of dirt and dust was covering anything that was exposed, including my computer. It cleaned up pretty good, but I was worried about the dust getting inside. I was lucky that everything was working normally, but I was reminded about how silly I am for not doing a back up.

Do you do back ups? I don’t, but I should. And you should too.

Imagine all the work you’ve done up until this point, and then imagine it all being erased. That would suck pretty hard hey? Yeah…it would.

There are a few options for storing your information safely. You can copy your computer files onto an external hard drive, on to CDs or DVDs, or you can even use your computer’s own backup feature. I would recommend however, that you store any information - especially irreplaceable stuff - somewhere away from your computer. If you want to get really serious, you can even store your backups in a fireproof safe or a safety deposit box.

So, the three lessons I’ve learned summed up:

• When going on trips and/or going through renovations, properly store or pack up your computer to take with you or prevent any electronic casualties.
• Always have a notebook with you, especially when traveling, in case you concoct some brilliant ideas while away from your computer.
• Even if you aren’t traveling or enduring reno’s, do a regular back up of information in case of fire, floods, power surges, theft, kids, or just plain computer-no-worky.

There are still a few more boo-boo’s I made during the past couple months and I’ll talk about those more in my next post, so stay tuned! Or just sign up for my RSS feed.

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Entry Filed under: General