BSOD Dell XPS 8100 HDD getting ready for The Big Sleep?

Twice in the last 10 days. Got BSOD, reboot. First time I was allowed to "restart Windows normally" from the menu. I have a Toshiba Canvio 1 TB external HDD running on a USB cable. The second BSOD, rebooting took me to the Canvio Restore app. It asked me if I wanted to restore my HDD to the last full backup. I canceled out of the dialog box, but it came back. I shut it down, disconnected the USB cable to the Canvio. On reboot, I was able to select "start Windows normally" again. I ran the Error Checking utility in Win 7. It found no bad sectors, nothing. Is the HDD giving me a heads up it is ready for its dirt nap?   Thx, USOP31