i can’t believe how STUPID i am

this one takes the cake.

tonight, while reaching for my ethernet cord from my bed, i leaned forward and pulled my OPEN AND RUJNNING macbook off of my bed onto the floor. that’s a two foot fall. i IMMEDIATELY saw the following sad sad scary screen:

anyone who knows anything about macs knows that THIS screen (like the windows blue screen) is almost always the harbringer of certain doom. and, what makes my situation even stupider is that i broke my ibook in a very similar way. you’d think i would have learned my lesson, once upon a time.

but you’d be very wrong.

back to the story: i followed my computer’s demand (screw “request” - i had no options) and i completely turned off my computer. the plan was to leave it alone for a few minutes but i was just waaay to anxious to see if i had to shell out real money for repairs.

but, amazingly, my macbook booted up without delay or even a slightly longer load time. i ran three disk verifications on my hard drive (after backing up essential data, of course) and my hard drive passed in each one.

magic? apparently not.

while it is always, ALWAYS a bad idea to drop your laptop, apple has considered the possibility of this event and has come up with some countermeasures.

(1) the macbook’s hard drive is “rubber-mounted,” meaning that the most breakable (and arguably valuable) part of your laptop is cushioned a bit.

(2) mac os x has what they call a “sudden motion sensor” protocol built in to try and save your hard drive if the computer “senses” it’s being dropped. now, as of yet, computers aren’t prophetic or intelligent, so “sensing” is more a poetic term than anything. what “sensing” means is that the hard drive will be immediately notified of sudden jarring of any laptop hardware and TRY to “stop” in time to protect the its data.

lord willing, apple’s forethought will be enough to overcome MY stupidity. but only time will tell if there’s any long-term damage to my computer.

hopefully i won’t find out in the middle of an unsaved graduate paper.

[in conclusion, don't drop things you like. unless they're bouncy balls.]
-brian.b