Call me unlucky (but it is a story ultimately about virtual teams, so thanks, sort of, computer).
For the second time in just about four years, I've had a total hard-drive crash. I documented what happened in 2009 here and here and here and here. There are likely even more posts but that's enough to get the drift.
So in the past two weeks, my brand-new (9 months old) superfast solid-state drive crashed as did my logic board on my MacAir, which is a toddler -- about two-and-a-half years old. The first offending item:
I could go through every step of this. Suffice to say that it's all taken place in 90+F degree heat, meaning everyone is cranky, and that the backup systems that I thought would handle everything are of course not working perfectly. In fact, I think it would be accurate to say they're working imperfectly.
But along the way, I've had some good customer service. Committed Endless Knots readers know that I'm a fan of the Apple Genius Bar. On this round, they did their best, which wasn't all that much, since the problem was hardware. Here's a picture of the nice team of people at the Chestnut Hill (MA) Apple Store -- Josh, Justin, and Melissa (l-r).
(I didn't take a picture of the not-so-helpful store manager whose name I will not mention but who refused to have a technician look at my machine when I was 14 minutes late for an appointment, even though I'd called and said I was held up in Fourth of July traffic and that I'd raced three-and-a-half hours--a trip that normally takes 2-1/4--to get there in time. No, person-whose-name-begins-with-C-and-ends-with-l, I won't mention your name.)
But the story involves Computer Loft, which had sold me the original OWC Aura 480SSD, and which ultimately replaced it (under warranty), along with the logic board (separate repair covered under AppleCare), and which is, even as I type, helping me restore my files from Carbonite, which went out of its way to hasten the restore process.
Long short, because my repaired machine is at the Computer Loft and, guess what, I'm not, we had to find a workaround whereby Carbonite's technician could have access to my machine, which required my setting up a gotomeeting, inviting Craig Marin at Computer Loft, then giving him control after which he downloaded a file from Carbonite, which allowed the Carbonite tech, Michael M in Lewiston, Maine, to access my machine, with me watching the process all the while via gotomeeting.
Here's a screen capture of the chat between Craig at Computer Loft and Michael at Carbonite from my machine as operated by Craig and as seen through gotomeeting on mine (my old machine that is, the one whose hard drive crashed in 2009).
The restore will take approximately three days, yes, DAYS, during the biggest heat wave evuh (remember, this is Boston), so, what do you think, a power outage might be a possibility? Just sayin'...
If you're the meditating type, please use the following mantra: May Jessica's machine receive all its files peacefully and without further unforeseen (and never before seen--I've heard that too often in the past two weeks) problems.
If you're the praying type, add in your appropriate religious figure/deity for good measure.
Thank you.
And please send me your email address as I've likely lost all of my email from the past 2.5 years, including all the mail I sent and received during the time my husband, Jeff Stamps, was dying. That's the real loss, the very poignant communication from that period, i.e. if you've got any mail from me, please send me that too.
Everything else is just material.
