It’s a lazy rainy Sunday and I’m loving it. Been cozying up with Tots and Joey in this fine bed weather and brunched on toast and Apollo Restaurant’s sun yat sen. Zach is over at the in-laws, spending some quality time with the grands. I’m missing him but I’m also quite relieved to be away from his nonstop chatter for a while. He can get pretty caught up in himself and sometimes a mom just needs a break, you know? I wonder how Mama Helen and Papa Jorge are faring with his never ending questions.
If you’ve been paying attention, I’ve been nonstop blabber myself. On Twitter, Facebook, this blog, my other blogs, I’ve been on a roll with sweet snippets of happy outbursts. I’m nonstop thankful, see! Here’s a grrrreat testimony of when God closes a door, somewhere He opens a window. About two weeks back, I was a speaker at a mini seminar to an audience of students at a small school for work. It was also the time my flash drive chose to die. Literally die. The laptop, or any computer there for that matter, could not detect it at all. I gave my lecture as I was supposed to so panic only seeped in back at my desk. That USB stick had everything, EVERYTHING that I needed for work. EVERYTHING from the last four years or so. To make matters worse, my proposals were due that week. I had always meant to do a backup, always had it at the back of my mind, really, really meant to do it… but didn’t. And I could just bang my head silly for not! And that it was happening AGAIN. What a dump I was in.
And so in between worrying about how I was going to reconstruct what I needed to turn in that week and searching for online recovery software, I turned to my mommy blogger group on Facebook. The ladies of PMC are awesome. I was there really for comfort, but I have to hand it to Kat. She buzzed me and sent me a file for data recovery. Didn’t touch it for days. I was scared. I remember all too well what last time felt like. Kat buzzed me again and asked how it went. So I felt I owed it to her for going thru the effort of finding the file and patiently sending it over. (I believe she had to coerce someone else to make it happen.)
Last weekend, I did it. I wasn’t hoping for much and I was right. My USB flash drive was busted to the core. Boo. Now I’d REALLY have to construct work files from scratch. And then… I remembered: the crash of ’11. So I retrieved that external drive and plugged it in. Not hoping for much, my heart skipped a beat when it lit up, then stopped a few seconds all together when the recovery software “found” it. Clicked the full recovery button, found that it would take some time (it actually took 8 hours total) and there before me was the bulk of 300GB for the picking. I may have lost the contents of my work flashdrive but the real prize is getting my lost digital photos and videos back from my back-from-the-dead external drive. They are from the year 2004 to 2010, the most memorable years. I cannot be thankful enough! Thank you, dear God. Thank you, Kat. Can’t wait to see you at our Manila soiree in November. From my heart, THANK YOU.
And what have you up there are photos from my personal stash. The earlier photos are not the best quality. They are from our cellphone cams since we didn’t own a digital cam then. But who cares? I have them back and that’s what matters.
1 Sophia, an hour old. January 2008. AN HOUR!!! If that isn’t precious, I don’t know what is.
2 Zach meets his sister for the first time.
3 Just being a goofball
4 Isaac, days old. January 2005. I know, right? DAYS.
5 Sophia.
6 Isaac, barely a year old.
7 Home from the hospital.
8 Isaac, first bath ever.
9 Kindergarten. First day. Isaac. Wouldn’t let go of Daddy.
Who would have thought they’d take forever to upload? To borrow how my friend Mec refers to her precious photos, I am being anal about mine too. I’ve got the recovered files on another external drive and upgraded Multiply and Photobucket to Pro. I am now on Smug Mug too and had to fork over mean cash for this but I believe it’s worth the investment. Either Multiply or Photobucket will probably die out of its pro phase, but we’ll see. And the photos are still uploading. Especially the larger files. STILL.
If you read right up to here, you got a mouthful but truly, these words are from my heart. Many more recovered photos to come. So happy. Backflip happy!
Extremely thankful.
~0~
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[...] ~ 10.02.11 ~ 9 months later} Recovered! Not totally. Some photos were busted. [...]
Good to hear you got some of them at least
My pc crashed wasn’t able to recover much except what’s left from facebook he he. We better get on with those photobooks.
Thank you Didi. So many thinks we take for granted, pictures included. I’m sorry about yours. Yes, photobooks for the win!