Lost in (Cyber) Space

Do you have a backup plan?

Normally I do, however, this weekend I was unprepared for the Blogger outage.  If you didn't hear the news:  what should have been routine maintenance for Google's Blogger service ended up locking out users and removing users' data for more than 36 hours.  Google had worked over the weekend to restore lost comments and posts by rolling back data in their environment.  My post however, which was scheduled for today, was one of the casualties of their catastrophic human error.

Unfortunately for me, my post has forever been lost in cyberspace.  Perhaps I will rewrite it.  Perhaps I will restore it to its full glory.  Just not tonight.  I'm too distraught at the thought of having to re-invent, re-edit, and re-post something that may never live up to the original.  I suppose that's why we wear oven mitts: so we never burn our hands again.  I will be sure to be more diligent in the future backing up my data.

I love the fact that Blogger is free, but the real lesson here is you get what you pay for.

When I first learned of the Megaminx puzzle, I knew I had to get one.  But they were pretty expensive (and I wasn't sure I would be able to solve one anyway.)  Why invest in a quality Megaminx?  I thought I would try to solve it once and then be done with it.  So I sent for a cheap one from China.

This is a cheap Megaminx

I began to solve it, then it fell apart and exploded in hands.

This is a Megaminx Explosion

I was embarrassed.  I wasn't embarrassed because I couldn't solve the puzzle.  I was embarrassed for being cheap and not expecting the puzzle to explode in my hands.

It's the same with writing.  I don't get embarrassed with typos or grammatical errors...ever writer makes those.  But I am embarrassed that my original writing was lost, never to be restored.  I did not have a backup plan.  I can only hope that when I do rewrite my post it will be better than the original.

Has anything like this ever happened to you?

Random Recommendation: 10 Difficult to Write Pieces

Whenever I face a daunting challenge, (how about that crazy cube at left?) I remind myself that the world is full of amazing people who make the impossible seem like child's play.  This post is dedicated to all those super humans.

I read this great article that shows us just how amazing people can be when put in extraordinary circumstances...or who simply wanted to challenge themselves – beyond what us mere mortals would consider difficult.  If you think solving the Rubik's Cube blindfolded is impressive, wait until you read this post.

The article ranks ten works of literature based on how difficult they were to write.  From a novel written without the letter, e, to a successful novelist who was still years away from puberty when she wrote her first novel, to a memoirist who emerged from a coma to dictate an entire book exclusively with his one eye, this blog post is nothing if not inspirational.

Reading the list also will give you some perspective when you're searching for an excuse not to write.  Enjoy it here:

10 Works of Literature That Were Really Hard to Write

Let the hero worship commence.  I bow down to all you amazing people out there who keep me humble.

Happy Writing!