All I want for Christmas is a Maxtor OneTouch External Hard Drive 12-Volt AC Adapter

This rather banal item to the left here looks like a fairly standard, wholly uninteresting piece of electronic equipment, but it 'tis my white whale. See, I have a Maxtor OneTouch 120 GB external hard drive. On it is stored what I believe to be a veritable buttload of MP3s, songs which previously resided on the first iPod I owned, the one stolen from my car in the early months of '06. I immediately purchased a replacement 60-gigger, but my music files were so scattered -- on a laptop, on a PC, and on that hard drive -- I found the task of rebuilding iTunes way too daunting. Besides, I was finally moving out of my parents' house. I had my mind on other things, so I never got around to actually filling up that new iPod until the bug to do so hit me recently.

I've retrieved the MP3s from my parents' computer. I've retrieved the MP3s from my barely-working laptop. I've retrieved the MP3s from an old computer that's been sitting in my closet. All that's left for me to retrieve and thus bring the closure to the theft of my original iPod are the MP3s on that hard drive. Alas, having not touched the thing in a year, in which I've moved exactly thrice, its power supply is moving. I figured it'd be simple enough to replace. Could possibly be slightly expensive, but what the hell? I have the entire Cult discography on there!

I go to Radio Shack first. No luck. Try Best Buy, they say. OK. The dude there lets me know, without hesitation, that they carry nothing powerful enough to juice up my baby. Try Fry's, says they. I do. The first idiot suggests some $10 all-purpose piece of shit should do the trick. I'm skeptical, but hey, it's only $10. Not much risk there. I race home, plug it into the back of my personal goldmine and ... nothing. At this point, I resign myself to having to go through the company, where I'm sure I'll get gouged. Making matters worse, Maxtor is now owned by Seagate, and the majority of their products are quickly becoming obsolete. But, actually, the part is sold through their online store, and it's rather inexpensive -- only $30 (the universal adapter I bought for my laptop years back was close to $100, so in my mind, that's a deal). Only problem: currently out of stock. Dammit!

So, after a few weeks of sulking, seething and attempting to physically shake the songs out of my hard drive (to no avail), I return to Fry's, figuring I was simply consulting with a mongoloid on my prior visit, and would do a better job this time of finding somebody who knows what the fuck they're talking about. First guy I speak to is some douchebag in the parts department who, after hearing my query, mumbles, "Aisle 9B," without ever once looking me in the face. Hey, obviously, I'm no technophile -- I really have no idea what I'm supposed to be purchasing here, but this retail skid mark clearly has no interest in helping me, so I march over to 9B to take a stab at something that'll be compatible with my rapidly depreciating digital storage unit.

I'm staring at a wall of adapters and power cords. They all look shitty. But one is big and bulky (which I assume such an adapter would need to be for this hard drive -- it's ungainly little thing that feels like it's about to explode when you turn it on), and at $60, I assume it should work. Just to be safe, I ask shit stain if it's compatible with the hard drive I'm carrying around, and he gives me a fairly confident, "Yeah, you should be good." Who am I to question a Fry's employee?

I sacrifice $60, speed home yet again, plug the female end of the adapter into the drive's modest male appendage, and ... nothing.

Motherfucker!

As of this rant, the treasure trove of old MP3s remains locked in its silver coffin, destined to remain there until I can find a goddamn compatible AC adapter. No stores online have the part in stock. There are some available on eBay, but that just seems like so much, y'know, work. I guess I could always figure out a way to power it using electrolytes and an onion.