ADVICE TO DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHERS: When you get back from a picture-taking expedition, immediately copy the photos to your computer and then burn a CD or DVD of the files. Label the disk and file it. I needed a picture I took four years ago, and was able to go straight to the disk and pull it up in about two minutes from scratch. That’s despite a hard drive crash and a couple of computer changes.

I don’t do this quite as regularly with the family snapshots, but I do it there, too, whenever the camera starts to fill up.