A Writer's Nightmare

 "Is it safe to come out?"

I wanted to make the title A Writer's Worst Nightmare but the incident today wasn't the worse that could happen. There are several scenarios which are much worse, but I won't look at those today. 

This morning, as it was my usual day off work I was happy about the prospect of getting some editing done on my fairy wip. 

"Yay! Time to edit!"

I settled down with my laptop. 

"Hurry up and load already." 

The moment I opened up my wip,I felt puzzled by what I saw.

I then felt mildly annoyed 

...after that I went a bit mental (it had to be done) I mean, why did the wretched thing get corrupt? Just why?

That led to my standard reaction of wanting to cry.

What on earth had happened?

 "What did you do to my wip?"

 

It's a bit hard to explain. I opened my wip, and the first few chapters were full of gobbledegoop. The very chapter's I'd just finished. Here's an example of the text 

“Me?e1435) ter 2 hu. e1435) ter 2 hugme remove the security spell?the

Her dad ran his hand through his greyish-blue hair.  “Yes,  you,eshe said. “Yousaidou,ctised enough and ites one of several treats to celebrate your Fledgling Fairy status.st

That's a moderate version of it. Some had repeated text, lots of numbers - it was almost indecipherable.  I was and am still pretty stumped how it happened.

I tried to see if I'd clicked on something to make it go like that. All the settings were normal. I then checked an earlier version as I usually email myself my work every day. Turns out I hadn't done that since Saturday. In truth that's only 3 days worth of revision.I felt a bit gutted at having to re-edit the document, especially after how happy I'd been a few moments before.

After a few moments thinking. 

 (This is one of the characters from the anime & Manga Maria Sama Watches Over Us) 

I then got into my determined mode, eager for revenge.  

"I'll get you for this!"

There's was nothing I could do (part from grumbling on Twitter) so I started re-editing it. Thankfully the parts I'd changed were mostly legible. This afternoon alternating 15 minutes of editing with anime watching I caught up to where I'd lost my edits, and even managed to get a bit further ahead. Whoohoo! 

What happened today will probably forever be a mystery. I'm putting it behind me, and moving on.