A colleague told me yesterday that a classmate had an unfortunate laptop meltdown the night prior and lost all of her notes & outlines right before exams. Said colleague was surprised that I refused to feel bad for this classmate. True. I don't.

Like Doofus Runner-up #2, there are certain types of conduct that don't justify sympathetic response. If this person had carefully backed up her work, but then both her laptop & backup were destroyed in an unlikely natural disaster, that would justify sympathy.

But given that the laptop contains months of irreplaceable work, isn't it the cheapest possible insurance to, you know, copy it off the laptop once in a while? I mean, you could just email it to your mother. I'm sure she'd love to read about the entanglement exception anyhow.

05 May 05