In case you missed my freakout on Facebook last night:

I still can’t believe I did that. I’ve had my MacBook for 3+ years and never had a snafu like that. But the very first night I bring my work laptop home (just this week I got hooked up with a gorgeous 13″ MacBook Pro and 27″ LED Apple Monitor!), I go and knock over an ENTIRE. GLASS. OF. WATER. on the keyboard which immediately short-circuited my comp. Nooooooooo!!

Everything kind of happened in slow motion.

It was nearing 11 pm and I’d just put in a good two hours of work. I decided to have a little midnight snack before bed and this huge, beautiful watermelon I’d just picked up from Safeway was calling my name… I saved my work, hopped down from my perch at the bar which I use at a workstation, and walked around to the kitchen. You know when watermelons are really big and you can’t cut through it in one swell swoop? Well when I finally got mine cut in half, gravity took over… I managed to catch one side while not slicing myself with the massive butcher knife I was wielding but the other side fell off the cutting board and rolled across the counter right into a water glass… It was a domino effect; everything lined up in a perfect storm for that shit to go down.

Cursing ensued along with attempts to dry out the lap top using a combination of techniques from the blow dryer and fan to silica dry packs. MacBook forums recommend taking lap tops apart to completely dry individual components before attempting to turn on. Only, you know how Apple likes to boast about the new MacBooks being built out of a single piece of aluminum? It may look pretty, but it means it’s nearly impossible to open them up. Shrek is pretty savvy when it comes to computers but he couldn’t get into this one with the limited tools we had on hand.

As my Facebook status relayed, I was really more concerned about the data I’d just destroyed (almost 4 years worth!) than the actual cost of the machine I’d just done in… I hadn’t yet backed anything up and my old computer had been wiped clean. Dumb dumb dumb. Lesson learned: back your shit up! Immediately. Fortunately, I have a really understanding supervisor who’s quite high up in the company and manages the finances. When I sulked into his office the following morning to confess what had happened, he said, “accidents happen even to people like us” (ha!) and told me to get over to the Apple Store asap to find out our options.

Hallelujah! The Genius Bar at the Apple store reported that I only flooded (yup, I confessed straight up what had happened) the side of the computer opposite my harddrive so all my data was completely salvageable. The computer itself, however, needed work… $1240 and 7+ days in the shop. After weighing this against walking out of the store with a new MacBook with my data on it for a few hundred more, we decided on the latter in addition to claiming the loss with American Express. (Or at least $1000 of it, which is the max Amex will pay per incident. Amazingly generous since it’s the only protection plan I’ve ever seen that covers accidentals like spilling water on electronics!)

Okay, so all this went down at the Apple Store around 11 am. Interesting side note: at 9 am (before the store opens at 10) I was online trying to make a reservation at my local Apple Store for the Genius Bar. However, the first spot I could sign up for wasn’t until 130 pm. Went down to the store anyways at 9:55 and they told me the soonest I could see someone was 1045. I was invited to go get a cup of coffee and come back for my appointment or check in immediately and hope someone cancelled. I maybe sat around for 10 minutes before a Genius asked if I was Mindy and could he help me sooner than my 1045 appointment. Um, yes please! I had my new MacBook with my recovered data on it by 1230.

…Ended up back at the Apple Store around 4 pm because American Express was requesting a copy of the estimate to fix the computer. I was confused when Jeff, my business contact at the Apple Store whom I’d been introduced to by my Genius, handed me a printed quote for $755. Turns out, the Genius had quoted me to fix a 15″ MacBook Pro instead of my 13″!! I was seriously upset with this news, considering that we’d decided to buy a new notebook based on the $1240 quote. You can buy a new 13″ Macbook Pro for $1200. Jeff apologized on behalf of Apple and offered to accept the return of my new computer for a full refund and I could go with fixing it instead. Um, thanks but no thanks. I just lost a day on reprogramming this one to fit my needs. Next he offered me a $150 discount (10%) off the new notebook… that we paid $1800 for!! (The 10% was off the $1500 notebook only. We had to buy a new Apple Care Protection Plan (which doesn’t cover accidental water damage, folks) + $100 data transfer + taxes and (recycling) fees.) Sorry, but no. While I appreciated his gesture, $150 is not even close to the $1000 extra we spent now knowing we could’ve fixed it for $800.

Each time Jeff came back with a new offer, he’d been conferring in the back with someone else. Finally, he came out and said they would cover the cost of fixing my drowned computer. While it was in the shop, I could continue to use my new computer. Once my original computer was fixed, I was to return the new one. They would then transfer my data back to the old computer and refund us whatever we paid for the newbie. Cool, now we’re talking! Upon my agreeing, Jeff went to get some paperwork for me to fill out. When he came back, he had the ultimate, even easier solution: FREE REPLACEMENT. Yup, I get to straight up keep the new computer! They’ll fix the bad one and resell as refurbished or do whatever they do with those. Crazy good customer service there, right?!! And I’m giving myself a little pat on the back for asserting myself. I tried to be as nice and sympathetic to his position in all this (after all, it wasn’t his fault!) while at the same time expressing my discontent. At least, that’s how I saw it from my point of view; he could think I was a total pain in the ass for all I know. Anyways, what a difference a day makes, eh? And how crazy is it that all those incidents had to line up for me to spill that water on my Macbook in the first place and later, all those interactions had to play out for me to get a free replacement with my original data on it?!

Happy Friday, all!