The Time I Cried at Best Buy

Oh my, today has been quite the day. Before I get to my wonderful story there are some things you need to know about me...

#1 I am obsessed with taking pictures. I am that girl at every occasion who is like, "take our picture, take my picture, let's take a picture!" I seriously take pictures of everything and my pictures are my prized possession.

#2 I hardly ever cry, especially in public. I just don't usually get emotional, unless I'm drunk...then that's a different story.

#3 I love my dogs, seriously I do...but sometimes I feel like they cause me nothing but grief.

Ok, story time...this past Christmas we decided to get an external hard drive for our laptops because they were running really slow. Well, that's bound to happen when you have almost 3,000 pictures on your hard drive. So we bought a hard drive and I transferred everything from my laptop to it and magically my laptop starting running faster! I know big shocker. Everything was fine and the hard drive was wonderful. Anytime I needed something off it, I just plugged it into my laptop and presto there it was.

Well a couple of months ago, the dogs managed to knock it off the table but everything seemed fine. It was still running normally and nothing appeared to be wrong with it.

Pause story: Let's talk about the fur babies...

Sadie and Lola both weigh over 50 pounds and they run around this house like it's the Indy 500. They chase each other full speed and destroy anything that comes in their path. They slam into furniture and walls and just keep on running. Oh and they are really loud while they do it, barking and growling and such...it really pisses me off.

Back to the story...so a couple of days ago in the midst of their chaotic wrestling, the dogs manage to knock the hard drive off the table, but this time I can't get it to start working again. I noticed that the little piece where you plug the USB cable into the hard drive has broken off...crap. Well it was only the little plug in piece that broke off, so that should have nothing to do with the actual switchboard of the hard drive, right? Yeah, keep dreaming Jacki.

This morning I go up to Best Buy in hopes that the Geek Squad people can fix this or at least just get my data off of the hard drive. I could care less about walking out of there with a working hard drive, so long as I have my data. So that you can fully understand my panic mode, here is a breakdown of all the things that were saved onto this hard drive...all my documents from FSU, all my Phi Mu stuff, my resume, lesson plans and activities from two years of teaching, our wedding photos, and every photo I've taken from 2005-Jan. 2011.

The guy at Best Buy looks at my hard drive and tells me that I just need a new casing for it. He can remove the internal components, put them in a new outer shell case and send me on my way for 60 bucks, no big deal. Yippie! So he goes in the back to take my hard drive apart and comes back about 15 minutes later. When he comes back I notice that it is all broken apart and not in a new casing like he said it was going to be. Initiate crazy Jacki panic mode now.

Apparently, when he tried to plug it my hard drive components to a computer, it would not work. Meaning that the entire hard drive, switchboard and everything, is dead. As I feel the emotional tidal wave about to crash over me and I ask him if my data can be retrieved from the hard drive...his answer: probably, but it will cost you. A sigh of relief, but then we get to the prices and I feel like I'm going to vomit all over that ugly blue Best Buy carpet. He tells me that they have to send the pieces of my hard drive off to a data retrieval company which will cost me $250. If they are able to retrieve the data easily then it will simply cost me the $250. However, if it becomes more complex for them to retrieve the data then the price goes up from there, up to about $1,000. Seriously? Two-hundred fifty to a thousand dollars to get my pictures back?!!!! This is where the tears begin to well up inside my eyes.

I tell him I have to think about it and talk to my husband so I need to take the pieces of the hard drive with me and come back later. He tells me that is fine and doesn't charge me for taking my hard drive apart, thankfully. As he is bagging up my hard drive, the tears start coming...I keep thinking, "I'm never going to get my pictures back". Blue bag in hand, I literally run out of the store and manage to make it to the parking lot before the monsoon of sobs begins.

After crying it out in my car in the Best Buy parking lot, I drove over to Michael's for some retail therapy. If there is a possibility that I might lose all these pictures, then I am going to scrapbook all the ones I do have. Now that I'm home, I have absolutely no desire to do any of the other tasks that I set forth for myself to accomplish today. Instead, I'm drinking a beer. Yes, I know it's only 2:30 in the afternoon but I don't care, I'm having a beer. Because I know that if I called my mother-in-law right now and told her this story, she would tell me to calm down and drink a beer, so that is what I am doing.

I know that to most people I am probably being absolutely ridiculous about this, but you must know how completely obsessed I am with pictures in order understand. In an attempt to calm myself down, I just keep thinking about how if this was 10 years ago, we wouldn't have back-ups of our pictures. So if a box of photos or a photo album got destroyed, then that was the end of it. Luckily, a lot of my pictures are on Ofoto or on Facebook, and we have a back-up CD of all our wedding photos. Unfortunately, pictures off of Facebook aren't really quality enough for printing purposes. Hopefully, they will be able to retrieve our data for the $250 price or otherwise I'm afraid I'll just have to kiss it all goodbye.

Here is what remains of my external hard drive...

So keep your fingers crossed that they can retrieve my data for me for the cheapest price so that I can get my memories back. I think I'll spend the rest of the afternoon scrapbooking and drinking to make up for this crappy day I've been having.