No, nobody died. (But just for the record, since I couldn’t find a pirate hearse, I think I’d like to be paraded around in the one above….the redneck hearse….when I go.)

I’m in mourning for all of the digital pictures that we took between February 2004 and May 2006.  They are gone.  Lost forever.  Never to be retrieved.  Vanished.

About a year ago, our main computer crashed.  We had working laptops, so we used those until we had our IT friend come work his magic on our Dell.  Before he took the hard drive away to his home, Big D downloaded all of our files, including the above mentioned pictures, onto an external hard drive for safe keeping.  Because those pictures were older, we never got around to trying to put them back onto the computer until just recently.  Well, guess what?  That stinkin’ hard drive failed, and the pictures are irretrievable.  I think I cried as hard as I did last year when my dog Bridget died.

Oh, we have a handful of photos from these years.  I had printed and scrapbooked some of them.  Big D was in the process of storing a lot of them on his photo site, so some are there.

Like these of Bonny Annie….

Or these of Dirty Harry….

*sigh*  Now I’m crying again….

Big D left this morning for a business trip, but secretly I think he just needs to get away from me and my hysterics.  I don’t blame him one bit.

And by the way, if you happened to take any pictures of my family between those dates and could get me some copies or make me a disc, I would be so grateful.  Debbie?  Susan?  Ma and Pa?  Amy?  Stalkers?  Paparazzi?  Anyone????  I will bake you cookies.  Scrub your toilets.  Give you a pedicure.  Anything….you name it.  I just NEED those pictures so that my kids aren’t missing approximately two years of their lives.

While I am still very sad that this has happened, Big D has encouraged me to look on the bright side.  Nobody died.  Our house didn’t burn down.  We didn’t have a trip to the emergency room.  The Titans won yesterday.  We’re on Christmas break.  I saved over $60 at Publix yesterday.

Yes, I’m still blessed, even without the pictures of Bonny Annie in her Cleopatra costume or Dirty Harry’s five year-old Star Wars party or our 4th of July trip to Charleston or…

Shoot…I’m crying again.