Oh man, I live in fear of losing a chapter like that! I know all too well how miserable it is to start over on something already done.

I do have an idea for you though:

If you can remember a few consecutive words from the story, exactly, and enough to make it somewhat unique, then you have a chance to recover it. Word stores it's temp files in weird places. So, the easier way I know to find the text, if it still exists, is to first undelete all .tmp and .doc files. Even if you can't undelete any, it might still be there in a file. So, do a text search in windoes search, use the old DOS wildcards *.* and search ALL files for your text string. You just might find it (I've recovered documents this way).

Also, I advise everyone to turn off auto updates on everything, especially windows. I do my updates manually, and just select the security patches and what I know I need (which is usually a fraction of the crap they want to "update".) For other programs? I don't update unless there is a good reason to do so. If it works, don't fix it.

If it works, don't fix it.

Hypothetically speaking of Microsoft... wouldnt that line read If it works don't break it?

I DID get a tree last night by the way... Its nice an pretty still alive and I got it 50% off now I just have to string in the 400 or so lights that go into it :wacko:

If it works, don't fix it.

 

Hypothetically speaking of Microsoft... wouldnt that line read If it works don't break it?

That is preposterous, for it would imply that it is possible for something made by microsoft to work right.

I DID get a tree last night by the way... Its nice an pretty still alive and I got it 50% off now I just have to string in the 400 or so lights that go into it :wacko:

Stringing lights is the easy part! The really "fun" part is finding dead bulbs and replacing them so the strings work! Get out your circuit tester!