Today's Blackberry outage has me thinking about how tied we all are to our gadgets. I don't personally own a blackberry – since I'm self employed my employer can't handle the expense of the service. But I am pretty dependent upon my cell phone, my laptop, and my PDA. If any of these were lost or damaged, I could be in complete disarray.
However, even beyond gadgets, I have had a situation this past two weeks that has caused me a tremendous loss in efficiency and productivity. In a rush to catch a close airline connection three weeks ago, I lost my eyeglasses. I'm a relatively new glasses wearer – I have needed a prescription for reading for about three years, and my distance vision started to go about a year ago. Last year, I purchased a pair of "progressive" lenses – newfangled bifocals without the line that enable me to actually see what I'm doing whether it's up close or far away. I hate wearing the glasses and have been dubbed "Mr. Magoo" by my family for the fact that I frequently claim blindness when my glasses are not in reach. I hadn't realized how dependent I'd become on the glasses until I lost them in the airport. For the past ten days, while waiting for my new glasses to be made, I've made do with a cheap pair of drug store reading glasses, but that doesn't do anything for my distance vision. Just this morning, I was filling my car with gas and happened to notice that the dollar amount seemed to be rising much more quickly than usual (even here in California!). Upon closer inspection, I realized that I had pushed the "premium" button without really seeing the label (and premium pricing!). When I squinted and saw my mistake, I chalked it up to yet another snafu related to my lost eyeglasses.
A lost cell phone, a service outage on the blackberry, or even a misplaced pair of glasses can cause major devastation to our productivity. I have now ordered a second pair of glasses to be held in a special place as a backup. My important contacts have secondary phone numbers to reach me in the event of an emergency. I'm looking at other necessary steps to back up my important tools. Are you prepared for outages, loss, or damage to your critical tools?
