And have we learned a valuable lesson, young lady?

So, Tuesday my hard drive crashed. My beloved MacBook was in desperate need of a transplant and unfortunately, laptops do not as "family members" so you can't take sick leave to take them to the computer doctor. Can you believe that? So I had to wait until after work to drive to the Apple Store where I had reserved time with a Genius. Genius Brian, or Brain as he was known in the store, diagnosed the problem. We had a brief discussion about data recovery and the need to back up files, etc. [Sidebar - kids, if you want to go into a very lucrative career, go into Data Recovery] I remembered that I had all of my music except for a few things I purchased on Monday but hadn't loaded on the iPod yet and all of my photos, contacts, calendars, etc. on my iPod and almost all of my necessary work files on the work server so felt pretty safe in saying c'est la vie. My warranty was still in effect so the transplant was covered. Genius Brian and I discussed how my old hard drive wasn't really "Dead" per se, but that it was going to live on a farm with other hard drives. I mourned the loss and vowed to do a better job of backing up data . . . especially photos.

Some of my 600+ photos are still living in cyberworld thanks to Flickr, Walmart and Snapfish but the rest are gone. Gone I tell you! GONE! deep cleansing breath - Ok, I'm better. But my favorites were still on the iPod. Like a smarty smart, I figured what goes on, must come off. Little did I know that the Apple gods had planned for just such a problem by making it a one way transfer. Rats, foiled again! Then I remembered reading something about a Photo Liberator. I found it, downloaded it and hooked up the iPod and SHAZAM - bye bye photos. At this point, I walked over to a co-worker's desk and proceeded to crawl under it. Seriously. I did. She calmly asked if I was ok and I said that I just needed a minute. She knows me pretty well so just walked away.

Once I crawled out from under the desk, I returned to my own and sent a frantic email to my own personal genuis - my brother. He sent me a link to a site that would retrieve the other stuff from my iPod like the 4000+ songs, videos, movies, etc. and it did. Not a single thing lost. Movie of my nephew singing Pat-a-Cake? Retrieved. Photo of nephew - gone. Movie of nephew asking to ride the motorcycle as only a 2 year old can? Retrieved. Photo of Star Wars Freak Son at the Star Wars Exhibit at the Science Museum - gone. [sidebar - if you know my son, PLEASE don't tell him. Mommy's not ready for that, yet.]

I do know that with all things computerized, nothing is really gone gone until you write data over it so now Genius Brother is charged with the task of finding software that I can use to data mine my iPod to find my photos. Yes, I know that even if I get them back, chances are they won't be "print" worthy but I will take them in any form I can get right now.

SOOOOOO.... what have we learned from this? Duh, back up your data. All photos will be uploaded to Snapfish as well as saved in my iPhotos. When iTunes asks if I want to back up my library, I will do so and if I don't, I give iTunes permission to say, "Are you sure, Dummy? Remember what happened last time!" And lastly, I will remember to post my bookmarks to my del.icio.us account like I used to before I got my laptop.

Who would have thought that in less than one year I would have so much of my life stored on a computer that I would need to post a HUGE blog about my loss?