NOOOOOOOOO!

If you've been following the laptop saga via Twitter then you know that my stupid laptop absolutely locked up last night and went blue screen of death on me. Unlike some of my geekier friends I only have one computer. After praying to the Gates God I managed to get it to work long enough to save my book to my flash drive but I haven't been able to boot it up since. It's in the hands of tech folks now but they've already told me that the hard drive is hopeless.
I had hopes today of moving my manuscript onto an office computer and backing it up somewhere online but I was simply too busy and had no chance to sit down and do it. I did manage to check out a loaner laptop but I didn't get a chance to use it today.
So I put the flashdrive in my bag and guarded it all day. At least i thought I did.
Tonight after coming home from a pleasant drink with friends I went to my bag to get my drive out and IT'S GONE!!!!!!!!
I've dumped out the bag. I've searched in the lining. I've unzipped everything and turned every notebook and file folder inside out and I can't find it. With only ten days to go until my final deadline I am without a manuscript. My editor is away and her admin is useless. And even if I did get their latest version I'll have weeks of rewrites to do over again! I'm sorry to be a blog-whiner but anyone out there who's ever written anything more than a few pages long should know what level of freak out I'm at. 300 pages gone! There is NOT enough wine in my fridge to solve this panic.
Time to start emailing everyone I saw today to see if they picked it up by accident or saw it on the ground.
Deep breaths and a little WWSD (What would Sherlock do) mantra.
Wish me luck!