One of the most memorable moments for me was late one friday afternoon in August when I recieved a call from Bob. " I've just lost the entire film", he said. Unable and unwilling to understand what had just been said, I asked him to repeat himself. "I was backing up the film onto the new drive and all of the sudden it just stopped. I can't get it to open up anything and its everything we've worked on for the past three months." My first thought was, how handy it was that I was standing in a liquor store, and I told Bob I'll be right over. I really couldn't believe it and I had to see for myself. Seeing for myself however wasn't at all satisfying. In the old days of mechanical failure there would be smoke, a burning smell, and horendous grinding noises that were indicators of a mechanical melt down. In this modern world we live in, we stare at a motionless silver box and a blank screen. It seemed so surreal that the entire summer's effort to finish this film was gone. In true Murphy's law scenario, the only things that were still there were the things we were not going use!

We sat down and contemplated the future. Luckily there is a whole indusry that has sprung up to retrieve data from this type of meltdown but it comes at a very high cost. What should we do? Going back to interview people never seems to get similar results as the first time when everything is fresh.

Our commitment to the project was on the line and we decided to bite the bullet and pay for data recovery. The idea of walking away from all the time and energy and that goes into a project like this was never truly on the line but to contemplate our alternatives was a sobering experience. These days we've come out of the experience with our data saved and we are down to the final edits (I hope)! Bob now does triple back ups on everything. Making a film is always a process of discovery and I've discovered that the saying Nothing is easy and nothing is cheap has taken on a whole new meaning for me.

Collecting is in Debbie's blood. Both of her grandmothers collected, and so did her dad. Now her three sons have collections, too.

Debbie has the oldest collection we've encountered. Her maternal grandmother started collecting miniature shoes in 1941. She passed her collection on to Debbie, who collects little shoes to this day. The same grandmother gave Debbie her first Barbie in 1959. Her Barbies are Debbie's favorite of her many collections, and she still loves to dress them up. Debbie's grandmother also made the beautiful wedding dress in the second picture.