Technology: Can’t Live With it, Can’t Live Without it

My brand new computer died.

Well, not died as in DEAD, but it basically needed open heart surgery at the Apple store last week. One day I opened it and it wouldn’t accept my password, wouldn’t allow me to change my password, and basically refused to acknowledge my existence and ownership.

What the Apple Geniuses deemed an easy fix: “Oh, just let me try this and this…” Became: “Um, you’re going to have to leave it here for two days and we will have to erase the hard drive.”

EXCUSE ME? Erase my hard drive? As in: erase the last two months of work on my brand new book? THAT kind of erase?

 

Yep. That kind.

Two days passed and I had finally stopped hyperventilating when Apple called for me to come pick up my computer from the hospital. Once there, they wanted me to log in to make sure everything was back to normal.

But…IT STILL WOULDN’T LET ME LOG IN!

At this point, I’m taking it personally. Does my computer hate me?

Why won’t it play nice? Confused, Mr. Genius takes my laptop back and keeps it another five days. With weekends, it was over a week before I got the ornery thing back. A week without a computer is like functioning without a major body part when you’re a writer.

But losing my WIP was definitely the worst outcome of the ordeal. The. Worst. I was eleven or twelve chapters into my story, Unveiled. The loss of two months of work brought me down to four chapters, once they transferred data from my old computer. And those four chapters had been greatly reworked as well the past eight weeks. *sigh*

Moral of the tale? BACK UP YOUR COMPUTER, HEATHER! I really have no one to blame but myself. In true blonde form I had completely stopped backing up to a thumb drive after my trilogy was complete. Not on purpose…just never had the presence of mind to do it, although I was talking to my husband about getting some sort of automatic back up in place (Dropbox has officially been designated, after the fact).

Yep. Tough lesson to learn, but admittedly it could have been much worse! Two other authors shared that they lost ENTIRE MANUSCRIPTS that way. Finished pieces that they were beginning to polish. Ugh! That makes me thankful for my rather pitiful loss, in comparison. These authors also shared that the books they had to rewrite were much better the second time around. Their loss had been a blessing in disguise 😀

God promises that “All things work together for our good…” (Romans 8:28) and so I am finished freaking out and am now choosing to be thankful that this rewrite is for my good…and for the good of my story.

 

Back when my first book, The Tethered World, was released, there was a major mishap with the file for the final version of the book. Somehow, the old, proofreaders’ file did not get replaced with the final, polished file on Create Space (still a mystery as to what happened). I bought 200 copies of that book–not knowing it was messed up until a reader pointed it out well after I’d sold over 100 of my own and who knows how many on Amazon 🙁

I was sickened and so was my publisher. I even blogged about it, hoping to spread a wide net of apology for anyone who had one of those imperfect copies. And since we couldn’t prove who was at fault, I could not return my other 100 or so books to the printer. S-l-o-w-l-y I have sold them or given them away with a short explanation and apology for the mistakes inside (all in all, only five mistakes that had lingered in the proof copy–could have been worse!).

You know what? Readers didn’t care. In fact, they thought it was kinda cool to get ahold of a less-than-precise specimen and told me wistfully that one day this “first edition” may be worth something 😉

How about you? Do you have a love/hate relationship with technology? Any horror stories to share? I think we all have those embarrassing autocorrect texting mishaps that have made us blush!

If I had to handwrite my stories like authors of old, there would not be a Tethered World Chronicles. A death-grip on my pen means I can’t suffer through more than one handwritten page. In this way, I’m so thankful for technology! But I do wish I was somehow less dependent on it. Maybe a typewriter would be a good compromise?

I’ll never know.

I’m just glad I’ve got my bratty little laptop back and am hoping to sprinkle some new awesomeness on this mystery/fantasy of mine. Please share your technological blunders in the comments!