Hey! When was the last time you backed up your personal computer? Why don't you go do that right now, and I'll wait for you to come back. Go ahead, I'll be fine here.

Ok, hi again. Why the service annoucement? Well, my 8-month-old MacBook bit the big one yesterday, suddenly going to an all-white screen. When I went to the Genius Bar, the Genius guy diagnosed it before he even opened it. And the diagnosis: murder. Er, hard drive death, which is in no way an Apple problem, he assured me. Could happen to any computer, ever! Macs are perfect! Well, everything I've done since 3/23 is gone, so pffftt to that.

Sigh. Now I know that an Apple employee would never cop to it, but if I've said it once, I've said it a million times. PCs slowly die, Apples go from perfect to FUBAR. I've had iPods do it. They made a freaking "Sex and the City" episode about it, for chissakes. (Don't fight my anecdotal evidence!) It's why I backed up my new Apple laptop, despite never having done it on all my PCs (most of which still turn on, even if they're slower than molasses, MacBook). And I'd probably have never gotten around to backing it up at all if Cossar hadn't given me an external hard drive, so ten points to you, Cossar.

Yesterday I had blisters from my new sandals, sneezes from my allergies and a dead computer that is still under warranty (therefore a personal but not financial shitstorm). Such minor indignities and injustices this world throws at me! The worst part is that I couldn't sleep all night, freaking out about some pictures I lost (they were for a Time Out story and really important) and how hellish it would be today trying to find replacements. Even though I knew that today I'd just buckle down and handle the frickin' problem, I lost most of a night's sleep tossing and turning, and that just blows.