What a weekend !!!!!!

I shall not actually type the words that come to mind at the minute. As the saying goes - "If you can't say anything nice - say nothing at all!"

This particular blog was going to be a "happy" report on what had, to that point been a pretty good week. Everything was OK'ish.

The kids had been to the Doctors and got medicines and treatment for their various ailments.

We had just got a reasonable webcam to play with (the old one worked and that was it really). The kids loved it. Used it make "movies" with the software that came with it.(It is a logitech quick Cam with imagestudio - pretty good)

And that is where everything comes apart.

I was on the computer, as usual, yesterday morning. Looking , and sorting, as it happens, a new template for my Blogger.com blog. They have just upgraded their operating system and the template I was using had got corrupted in some way. To be honest it was just the impetus I needed to do the alteration I had been wanting to do for several weeks. Anyway I found a good choice on Blogskins , and having picked a simple , straightforward, template,applied it and altered it to suit my site.

Basically everything was OK.

So I closed down the computer and went on to do "bits and pieces" of house work, you know - the normal minutia of family life.

After tea, Stars in Your Eyes Kids, and a couple of moaning kids, I thought I would have five minute on the computer  before Bath and Bed. Powered Up, watched the two drives boot and then silence

Nothing.

I tried again. Nothing

"Luckily" we had an extended warranty with the computer. With trepidation I rang the number. I had heard, and experienced various bad stories involving trying to get "what you've paid for".The number rang. Then the dreaded "Voice Platform"

"Press 1 for ............, Press 2 for ........."

Anyway, through this section to be answered by a chap called Pete. He asked for the details he required, Customer number and the like. Two questions and a couple of checks later he came to the conclusion I had already suspected was the case - The Hard Drive had given up the ghost. Major pain. Had not backed up my files for about three weeks ,and we had just transferred some digital birthday pictures. They've now possibly gone -  along with several other projects and the new Smith Family Website .

My problem. The lad on the Customer Support line, Pete, was a great help. In fact he was the total opposite of what you sort of expect of a computer support line techie.

This posting?

I have borrowed a machine for the morning - so it maybe a week or so before I can do this again.