But it’s a little early to be thinking of summer, isn’t it? So why would I mention this in the middle of February?

Oddly enough, even in the dead of winter, with temperatures in the single digits and several feet of snow piled up around the house, I still love a good ice cream sundae. Especially if it has peanut butter ripples, frozen pieces of candy, or chunks of cookie dough.

Some things are just better when they’re frozen, but a computer is definitely not one of them.

When your computer decides to freeze up or hang, it usually does so at a crucial moment, like when you’ve just spent several hours editing a Word document and haven’t saved it yet.

That feeling of dread sets in. You begin to panic, and then you fear the worst: that all your hard work will be lost.

Sometimes, unfortunately, this is the case. But there are some steps you can take to ensure that your work will be recovered in the event that Word crashes.

If you enable the AutoRecover feature, which is available in several of the Office applications, it will periodically save a backup version of the file you’re working on. Then, if the program quits unexpectedly, it will prompt you with the recovered file the next time you open that program.

There is no guarantee offered with the AutoRecover feature, and at times it will fail to recover your work, so your best bet is still to save frequently when working in a file. You may find it much easier to use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+S to save your work as you’re typing, without your fingers ever leaving the keyboard. If you can get into this habit, you might just find your left hand automatically reaching for those keys without you even realizing it!

When the Deep Freeze sets in, whether it’s Windows, an Office application, or a mobile device, we don’t want you to be left out in the cold. The tips for this week will provide you with a starting point for when it seems like all is lost.

• What’s Frozen? – How to determine whether it is Windows or an application that is frozen
• An Ounce of Prevention for File Loss – How to enable the AutoRecover feature for Microsoft Office applications
• Mittens for Your Computer – How to clear out temporary Internet files, cookies, and browsing history
• Save Your Fingers By Letting Your Fingers Save Your Work – Using a keyboard shortcut to save while working in a file

And since you can also experience crashes on mobile devices, here are a few tips that can help you with BlackBerry and Windows Mobile:

• Just In Case – How to back up your BlackBerry data
• How to Thaw a Frozen BlackBerry – Resetting a frozen BlackBerry device
• Frozen In Your Hand – Resetting a frozen Windows Mobile device

We hope you’re enjoying the podcast and all the tips. If there are any topics you’d like to see covered in a future episode, please let us know in an iTunes review, or leave us a message on Twitter @productiveUcast.

That’s all for this week. Try to stay warm even when your computer is freezing, and we’ll see you next time!

Music courtesy of Clayton & Fulcrum

Chocolate chips, snickerdoodles, and gingerbread men by the dozen. We humans have a tendency to celebrate various occasions with food, and I am by no means opposed to this time-honored tradition.

More than the joy of indulging in the sweet treats, however, I am fascinated with the process of creating all these dozens of cookies, especially those for which a cookie cutter can be used.

Using just one gingerbread man cookie cutter, for example, one can amass an entire teeming population of a gingerbread village. But even though they are all born from the same dough and cookie cutter, are they all really the same? Heck no! During the decorating process, each one can be customized with gumdrops, icing, or other accessories. For instance, you can sharpen a candy cane to a fine point and arm your gingerbread village inhabitants so they can protect themselves in case the evil fruitcake monster attacks!

Oh, what? Like you’ve never armed your gingerbread men cookies with sharpened candy canes so they can protect themselves in case the evil fruitcake monster attacks?

Anyway, another process which many people undergo during this time of year is that of sending holiday greeting cards. And it just so happens that there is a tool that can aid in this process. A tool which, like the cookie cutter, allows you to create dozens of greeting cards from a single document, yet still personalize each one with ease.

I’m referring to a software tool in this case: the Mail Merge feature in Microsoft Word.

Performing a mail merge operation greatly simplifies the process of sending out personalized mass mailings. All you need is a merge document and a data source. The data source is typically a set of contact information fields, such as first name, last name, address, etc. These fields can be housed in an Excel workbook, an Access database table or query, or it can even come right from your Outlook contacts.

The merge document can be in the form of a letter, a set of mailing labels, or envelopes. This document gets associated with the data source file during the merge process. Then, wherever a piece of personalized information needs to appear, you can insert a merge field from your data source. During the last step in the merge process, you can choose to either create a set of documents from the merge document (one for each record in your data source), or just send the documents directly to the printer.

Of course, a Mail Merge will really only save you time if you know your way through the process. Since it can be a bit tricky for novices and pros alike, we’ll include some tips that should help you through it.

The tips include:

• Mass Messages: getting started with Mail Merges in Word
• Start at the Source: tips for setting up Excel data to be used in a merge
• Do Not Label Me: using the Mail Merge feature to create mailing labels
• Pushing the Envelopes: using the Mail Merge feature to create mailing envelopes
• Split ’em Up: using Excel’s Text to Columns feature to split data into separate columns
• Published en Masse: performing a mail merge in Publisher

In all seriousness, I think you need to really think this through. I mean, if the evil fruitcake monster attacks the gingerbread village and they don’t have any sharpened candy canes with which to protect themselves, it’s really going to get ugly.

Oh, well. Don’t forget to stop by and visit us on Twitter @productiveUcast, or head over to write a review of the podcast on iTunes!

Until next time, keep cranking out those cookies and holiday greetings by the dozen!

Music courtesy of Clayton & Fulcrum