Sunday, October 12, 2008

I Feel Like Carrie Bradshaw

And not in an "I'm-a-size-0-with-tons-of-sexy-shoes-and-a-flourishing-writing-career" sort of way.

Remember the episode when Carrie's computer died, and she just wanted to cry because all of her writing was on it and she had never backed anything up? And then everyone she told tried hard not to laugh saying, "Did you back anything up?" And remember how she just wanted to crawl in a hole and cry?

(Can you see where I'm going with this?)

So, you guessed it (I hope): my computer died on Friday.

I have a laptop for work, so that's the computer that I use all the time. For everything.

One minute I was working, the next I was staring at the rainbow pinwheel. For an eternity. So I shut off my computer and turned it back on. Maybe it was stuck or something. 

I called the tech team immediately.

TECH:  "What do you see?"

ME:  "A solid blue screen with a picture of a file folder and a flashing question mark."

TECH:  "Oh."

It's amazing how one little word, one little syllable, when paired with a descriptive tone, could hit you right in the pit of your stomach.

Tech came and tried to revive her, but it was no use.

TECH:  "I'm going to send her to the Mac doctor to see if they could retrieve the data. Keep your fingers crossed."

I don't care about the presentation I was working on for Monday, that I will now need to spend my Sunday re-doing.

I am lamenting the hundreds of pages of writing (which included about 150 pages of my "novel" that I had started) that are now gone.

Gone.

G-O-N-E.

Yes, I know there's a chance that the Mac people will be able to retrieve the data from my computer.

And yes, I know that I should have backed up my stuff.

And that it's technically my fault.

And I can't blame the stupid computer.

But all of my writing? Gone?

Can a girl get a little sympathy? Please?

3 comments:

Lori Whitwam said...

HUGE sympathy!!! I would be devastated! 150 pages??? I might be suicidal. I deleted a 10 page essay (possibly the best thing I ever wrote) from a Yahoo group where I had it stored, only to find that it was my ONLY remaining copy. I'm still bitter.
And? My laptop? Making funny noises. I do not have anything backed up, either. Guess what I should think about doing??

Tasha said...

That sucks!!! Hopefully the tech people will be able to salvage your computer. 150 pages of "will work for shoes" writing is a very sad loss.

I don't back anything up either... the computer is supposed to BE a permanent place to store things! It's totally the computer's fault.

Andy - Instafather said...

I'm telepathically sending you a hug. Man, that's a rough one, especially because I know I never back enough crap up, either. I'd offer words of wisdom, but, you know, I'm usually an idiot.