Lessons Learned...and Snake

Last night I imported a week's worth of photos via Lightroom. I edited a few, uploaded some to Facebook, posted a few on my other blog, and went to bed.

This morning I realized my computer was frozen. I rebooted it and went to work.

After work, I hopped on, eager to play with more of the photos. Amid other things from the past week, there were beautiful morning glories, wisteria and azaleas at my mom's, bluebonnets and Indian paintbrush lining the highway...and the snake you'll see below. 

But they were gone. The previews were still there, teasing me, but Lightroom swore the original files were missing. I looked everywhere, but sure enough, the NEF file was no where to be seen. I checked Carbonite - the last backup was this morning. No NEF file from yesterday. 

And, of course, being the efficient photographer I am, I had re-formatted my card as soon as I saw my photos were safely imported.

After hours and hours researching and trying different things, I finally gave in, spent $17 and bought FileJuicer, which was able to retrieve jpg formats of the preview files somehow. 

Better than nothing. Sigh.

So what did I learn? 

1. Don't be so quick to re-format my card, for one. 
2. Manually back up my computer on Carbonite each night. 
3. And as soon as possible, bite the bullet and buy an external hard drive for my Mac. 

And now, I'll tell you about the snake...

This poor rat snake was doing his job down by our creek, minding his own business, when our dogs mistook him for something dangerous and injured his lower body. Tom rescued him and let him go in the pond. He swam around then slithered out onto these rocks. But you can see his lower section was still dangling in the water.

Tom used a stick to pull it up onto the rocks to show me how long he was.

Longer than me!

We weren't sure what to do with him.

We knew he wouldn't make it on his own. Ants and birds were already showing interest.

Poor thing.

Still trying to act fierce.

But we knew better. 

Tom used a stick and scooped him into this terrarium he'd lined with a soft towel.

Then he put the terrarium in the laundry room so Snake could die in peace, without being harassed by ants and birds and who knows what else during the night.

And he did.

Just one reason I love my husband.

(I promise I'll post the flower photos next...)


Thank you, Hilary!