July 3rd, 2010 Friday, ten minutes before 6am...
There is a double bang: a "ba-bang!" in the neighborhood.
I'm thinking THAT's a little early for the 4th, then notice all power GONE and my UPSs squeaking.
Tried to shut down my one AMV-making box, and I can't cuz there's not enough power to run the monitor.
I hit the power switch...
Power comes back on and I am back from work, and the C:\drive is TOAST.
Lost most of the 2010 opener, plus much of two other projects.
Thank you GOD for NAS boxes and BACKUPS. (Including the backups for the 2010 contest & shows...)
Was thinking of getting a new laptop so I finally bit the bullet.
All my cool old, PAID-FOR software doesn't work on Windows 7.
My wife has an old laptop with XP that can still run After Effects 5.0 and Premiere 6.0.
So I spend all the 3-day weekend CONFIGURING COMPUTERS instead of PLAYING on them.....
Still managed to complete the contest OP *before* the judges' panel. A first.
Now I have to learn Premiere Elements 8. Rrrrggh ... more delays....
... And the cause of the outage? TWO CROWS.
They simultaneously landed on the wooden crossbars of a utility pole - one between the 'A' and 'B' phase and the other between the 'B' and 'C' phase. With both of them there, wings outstretched, at the same time, the combined dielectric precipitated an arc.
Two DEAD crows.
And my dead computer, and LOTS of wasted TIME and money spent I had wanted to spend elsewhere ...
