Wait, he just handed back four grand on the spot like it was nothing?

Two referrals from one lunch sounds less like a system and more like a good day. A plumber overhearing you complain about a busted lift is just being in the right room at the right time. If that potluck had five quiet Tuesdays in a row, would you still be paying that $250? One lucky lunch does not mean shared tables beat working alone.

How often do you actually swap out that drive at your sister's place? Here is the thing nobody tells you, you have to rotate it or it stops being a backup. I learned that the hard way too. If the drive sits there for a year and you never bring it home and re-sync it, all you are protecting is whatever was on it the day you dropped it off. So I do a swap every couple months, bring the off site one home, update it, take the other one back to my parents' house. It sounds like a pain but it takes like 20 minutes and it has already saved me once when a drive started clicking on me. You are not overthinking it at all, that is the right setup.