Smart phones are ideal companions, but they're easy to lose and easy to steal. Taking preventive measures before something bad happens and preparing to deal with a missing device is well worth the relatively small amount of time required. In Short Circuits: We can't eliminate errors and stupidity, but we can ensure that we can recover from stupid events. What we need is something that will save our data when undo doesn't work or isn't available. • Say "Excel" and just about everyone will think "spreadsheet", "analysis", or "math". Certainly Excel is the right tool for calculations, budgets, and accounting, and even for creating a perpetual calendar. But Excel has some powerful text capabilities, too. Twenty Years Ago (only on the website): In 2002, Windows updates were often installed using a CD, but users had to pay for shipping. Some updates could be downloaded for free. Service Pack 1 weighed in at 40MB and Microsoft said that it corrected about 300 bugs.