Banjo versus TV: Week 45

A weekly check-in on the Banjo versus TV project — J.R.'s resolution to spend more time in 2008 on his banjo than on TV. This post covers 11/04/2008 through 11/10/2008.

Election week. Big week for America. Big week for TV watching. Not so big a week for banjo practice.

Banjo versus TV: Week 44

A weekly check-in on the Banjo versus TV project — J.R.'s resolution to spend more time in 2008 on his banjo than on TV. This post covers 10/28/2008 through 11/03/2008.

I tried to keep up with the banjo-playing penguins this week, but they were too fast for me so I concentrated on some Foggy Mountain Breakdown rolls.

Catch-Up!

Let's hear it for catch-up!

It's been a busy end of the year, but I'm determined to make up for my neglect of my banjo blogging by catching up on my Banjo versus TV Project posts.

The Royal Moose Jug Band's video debut

Here's the Royal Moose Jug Band...

...and our rendition of Duelin' Banjos for banjo, jugs, gutbucket (washtub bass), spoons, kazoos, xylophone and the three-headed guitar.

Turn on closed captioning to see who's playing what.

Santa Tracker: 100.0 percent

...

You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

Santa Tracker: 89.6 percent

Okay, so it'll be two last pushes. But look how close we are!

Santa Tracker: 80.0 percent

Over the last month the packages have been trickling in. The Santa Tracker has crept its way up to...

Yay! Now it's time for one last push (maybe two) to wrap things up!

Get it? Wrap? Get it?

Why this kind of message doesn't worry me

OH NOZE! I booted up my Windows XP Tablet Edition laptop this morning to see the following HORRIBLE SCARY sequence of messages:

So am I going to LOSE ALL MY DATA and ALL OF MY PROGRAMS?

Nope. Here's why.

• I keep all of my data under source control. I mean everything. My Christmas shopping list. My business stuff. The photo of my niece at her 8th birthday party. Everything.
• I install programs from a network share, never from CDs. When I get a new program on CD I copy the install files to a network share before I run them. The network share is backed up.
• I keep a log of every program I install. If my hard drive fails (or other disaster strikes) and I need to reinstall all of my programs, I just repeat the steps that I've put in that log. The log is, of course, under source control.

Yeah, I'll look into this failing hard drive. I'll use SpinRite on it and patch it up. But even if I let the drive fail, having followed the aforementioned good habits I'm going to be just fine.

If you're one of the people who would freak out by seeing the above messages, take that as a sign that you're doing it wrong. Stop treating your computer as if it's never going to fail and stop treating your data as if it will always be on your hard drive.