Thursday, July 19, 2007
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Thursday, July 19, 2007 |
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Community | Obits | Editorial & Columnists | Society | Sports | Education | Classified Ads | Calendar of Events | Features | Newsbriefs | Legals | Archives | Subscriptions | Photo Gallery |
| Fielder’s
Choice Stressed This Friday the 13th proved to be unlucky and rather stressful. The Tuesday before, during crunch time on deadline day, our main computer server was continuing to malfunction. We’ve had slight problems with it the past few weeks. That morning it needed immediate attention. We rushed it to Oxford to our computer doctor. I made it back to our office about 1 p.m. with a quick fix to hopefully enable us to get last week’s paper to press. It worked like a charm. We were a bit later than unusual, but not nearly as late as those ancient days we operated without computers. Things stayed in the calm mode until Friday, the 13th. That’s when I started to get ahead by putting together a page or two for this week’s paper. I had to restart my computer and others several times. I tried to produce one page for about three hours. Enough was enough. My kids joke about my bald spot. I was pulling what hair I have left out. We called our faithful computer doctor again, and he advised us to rush it in, to the emergency room so to speak. It sounded as if our hard drive, which contains everything we need to produce your newspaper, was crashing. We immediately backed up some of our more crucial folders, and then started praying. I was on edge the rest of the afternoon and even after I decided to go home. Friday night, my first text message from the doctor wasn’t so good. “The Server HD is failing. Will do what can to recover it. No luck so far.” – John. Needless to say, that put me in a bit of a panic. Sleeping didn’t look to be an option. I replied, asking about our options. As always, he remained optimistic. Unlike my two teenagers, I don’t get many text messages. A bit later that night, I received a very important one and my best one ever. “Have just finished getting a full copy on another drive. Breath easy. Had to copy in pieces. All OK now.” – John. I immediately replied with praises, plus to say the night’s sleep was going to be much, much easier. Our computer doctor continued his work Saturday, with the diagnosis continuing to look good. Later that evening, we had our new Server HD back in Holly Springs, at The South Reporter office, up and running. It’s Monday after lunch and things have gone pretty smoothly thus far in producing this week’s South Reporter and Pigeon Roost News. We’ve hit a few glitches here and there, but hopefully not anything we can’t work out. Friday the 13th, however, seemed to raise its ugly head again Sunday afternoon. Pam and I were driving Andy to Maywood Christian Camp in Hamilton, Ala., when we stopped in New Albany for gas. I had finished pumping, and Pam was returning to the vehicle after going inside for drinks. A man pumping gas in a vehicle next to ours said “M’am, M’am.” Pam did sort of a double take. “You have a nail in your tire,” he said. “What?” I replied. “You have a nail in your tire,” the kind man said again, pointing toward the rear, passenger side. I walked around to get a look. Sure enough, on the side of the tire, was the small, rusty nail. The tire was not leaking much, if any. The nail was acting as a plug. But I didn’t want to take a risk of rolling on toward Alabama, about 65 miles to Maywood. I really didn’t want to get stranded on the side of Highway 78. We found a place in New Albany to hopefully get it fixed, but instead, we ended up going with the spare tire. We got to Maywood about two hours late, but all worked out fine. I just found out late Monday afternoon my daughter had an automobile accident. She’s OK. Now I just hope Friday the 13th doesn’t come back anytime soon. |
 
 
 
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