Short sighted in Taos

WD, the ailing hard drive, was pronounced dead after a lengthy surgical procedure at a hospital in Novato, California.  According to doctors the drive had sustained severe head trauma and numerous broken bones and was unable to survive the delicate surgery.  No usable organs were harvested for future use.

This begs the issue of the sheer stupidity and lack of foresight that caused this crisis not to mention the quandary, read expense, of going straight back to Spain to recapture the magic. When I got the news Friday morning my reaction was mixed.   Certainly I was disheartened that Drive Savers couldn’t recover the data but my penurious self was $2,500 richer at least for the moment.

Those of you who have asked about the outcome know that I have jestingly said that I will have to go back to Spain, retrace my steps and get the lost shots. On Friday when I got the news that WD had died I concluded that I didn’t deserve to reward myself for failing to take measures that would have backed up the images. I deserve what I got.

Then again, this is a monumental loss for somebody who is possessed with recording his adventures and this hair shirt is really itchy.

According to those whose opinions I hold in high regard, namely three people so far, it is unanimous that I should go back to Spain and complete the job.  Still I waffle.

The thing is, if I take the “saved” $2,500 and put another $1,500 or so with it I can probably engineer a boots on the ground data recovery process of my own and, one could argue, do it better this time since I know the lay of the land and there would be precious little searching for places or subjects.  Just sayin.’

Here’s what’s at stake, amigos.  I lost the middle three weeks of a four week trip. So I don’t have images of Granada and the Alhambra; Seville and the cathedral (the third largest in the world) and Alcazar; Jerez with its sherry and famed equestrian academy; Ronda and the new bridge from which the partisans threw officers of Franco’s Guardia Civil; the beach and market at Estepona; all of Madrid and most of Gaucin and La Castilla del Aquila. That’s a lot to lose.

I'm struggling with this folks.