Fi Phillips

There was a time when I filled cupboards and shelves with my writing - pads filled with scribbles, folders overflowing with sheets of paper. Nowadays, the majority of my writing is stored on my laptop which is all fine and good if my laptop is healthy. My current laptop is quite new but in the past, laptops have died on me, to quite devastating effect. I learned my lesson though and I now have a memory stick or two, and our household has a couple of separate hard drives too (for all of our computers). I back up religiously, saving my latest writing as often as I write to ensure I never again have to suffer the loss of my creative workings. Why not help your writerly friend to safeguard their own creations by buying them a memory stick or a separate hard drive. It could be a life saver.

I trusted my laptop computer completely, until one day it died. As it happened, I was mid-write, working on a murder mystery play. I was on the final straight, approaching the finish line and *puff* the screen went blank. I quietly cursed my laptop as I tried to remember whether I'd saved recently. What I'd written was still fresh in my mind though so past the initial annoyance, it wasn't a disaster. I pressed the 'On' button. Nothing happened. I checked the power supply which was fine and pressed the 'On' button again. The laptop remained lifeless on my lap. Fighting the rising panic, I tried again. Still, there was no response. My laptop was dead. At that time, I was not in the habit of backing up but thankfully everything was not lost as my husband, an IT bod, managed to strip down my laptop and rescue the hard drive. Still, it taught me a particularly important lesson - back up your files. I now back up on a regular basis onto a separate hard disk....