Devoted to small businesses and those who run them

So, SmallBizMentor visitors, did you notice crickets chirping in the silence as I was absent a few days?  (Even if you didn't, stroke my ego and say you did.  Please?)

Lessons learned the hard way always stick best, right?  I'm here to share a few that hit me this week thanks to being spanked on the laptop by a super-duper spyware virus that killed my Vaio and has had me on the brink of a heart attack since Sunday night.

Here are the lessons I learned this week, and the blessings I'm counting:

1. Even if you are not particularly computer savvy, you should ALWAYS figure out a way to get (and keep) protection for your computer if you're connected to the Internet.  Like an idiot, I didn't have a paid subscription to a service...and I'm now probably going to pay much more than the service would have cost me to repair my laptop.
2. If you think it's time to create backups of your files, IT IS.  Never delay.  Had I created the CD I thought about creating last week, I would have had ZERO issues this week.  Since I didn't, I am now rebuilding virtually from scratch.  This includes re-writing a press release for a client that I wrote well over a month ago.  (Thank goodness such things often turn out even better the next draft anyway!)
3. If you're using a laptop for most purposes, keep your desktop, and keep it current.  More on that in a moment; you can count blessings with me and see why this situation was salvageable. 

Point being, even though I'm a fairly organized person and somewhat 'Net and 'puter savvy (though nowhere near some of my colleagues here at Know More Media!), I let things slip through the cracks and the ultimate "I hope that never happens" happened...and could have utterly destroyed my freelance writing business.  *PHEW!*  Wanna know why it didn't, and why I'm now breathing easier?  Read on.