Google Drive Disaster!

Technology can be a temperamental thing! For all the amazing benefits technology allows us, it can't half pis* us off!

As I am progressing nicely regarding my impending first publication of poems and songs, I have reached the exciting stage whereby I need to format the book, ensuring that it is ready to go to print. A few days back, I had breakfast, got dressed, and made myself comfortable, ready to spend the day formatting the book. Four hours later, it was done. This was my first attempt at formatting a book alone, so I was learning as I went. It is not an overly difficult task to format, but it can be rather frustrating, especially in Microsoft Word.

Proud of my day's work, I went to bed that evening excited that I had reached another development stage in my self-publishing journey.

Waking up the next morning, I wanted to have a final check of the formatted document, just to ensure I was satisfied with the results. But wait. What do you mean 'This File Cannot be Located'? I can locate it. I am clicking on the damn thing! I copied the file from my Google Drive, onto my desktop, and attempted to open it. It opened! Relief! So I scrolled down and found myself two poems in, and I could not scroll any further. Where's the other 100 pages? Balls. Somehow, the file became corrupt. I saved my formatting progress every 10 minutes. But somewhere between me completing the document and opening it the next morning, it became corrupt and there was no retrieving it.

A lesson learnt - always back up your work in multiple places and never assume the files are safe!