So . . . my Macbook died on Easter Sunday. Just up and died. Hard drive failure. I would have taken more time to savor the irony except I was, and am, on a bone crunching book manuscript delivery deadline, so I was busy gnashing my teeth and rending my clothing.

On the bright side, about a month ago I had subscribed to an online backup service that backed up all my new and changed files every night. Upon making my awful discovery Sunday morning, I grabbed my wife’s laptop and steered her browser to the backup site. There, sitting pretty as you please, was all of my data, including the book chapter I had sweat drops of blood to finish the night before.

Took the Macbook to the Apple Genius bar Monday afternoon and had my machine back in my hands with a shiny new drive installed by the end of the next day.

It’s probably going to take to biggest part of two days to get everything restored, and I simply can’t afford the time right now.

Had this crash happened a month ago, I would have lost a couple years worth of irreplaceable work and pictures.

So let my near-catastrophe serve as a cautionary tale. Back your stuff up.