10 November 2010

What I really wanted to blog about

I finally got around to reading a book I've been aware of since I was in elementary school, but never read, Across Five Aprils. And it reminded me so much of a family in my mom's ancestry. They lived in Illinois, and one of the sons went back to the area his father's family was from to fight for the South.
But I tried to look for the details and couldn't find them. I'm so sad. It was information I'd just found in the last couple of years and is trapped on the dead (presumably virus-laden) computer. Why, oh, why hadn't I backed up my family history data in so long? Oh, because the CD writing drive had been dead for a long time, and most of the USB drives, too, and I could never find a flash drive anyway since James was always taking them to work...and a million other excuses. But, honestly, I could have emailed myself the file at any time. Instead, I just "backed it up" on the hard drive.
And so many, many hours of work are likely lost, for the failure to take a few minutes. Hitting my head on the desk now.

The one condolence in this is that the most vital information, needed for temple ordinances, is mostly intact on NewFamilySearch. But that's the bare bones. The meat of it was in my notes.

2 comments:

Ashley said...

Ack, ack ack! That totally sucks. At least once a year, usually when we are headed out on vacation to vegas, Roy backs up the hard drive and burns a cd or two and takes it to his mom's house. So not only are things backed up, but they are in a separate location. Sometimes I love his OCD tendencies :)

Bob, Dad and Grandpa said...

You inspired me to back up my files.