OK - here's what happened. And I'm sharing this because I didn't even know this could happen.
I downloaded a word document from outlook and when I went to place it in a folder, I accidently clicked on an excel file. That document overwrote the excel file!!!! But in the view mode, it still looks like an excel file with a .xls extension. If I open Word, then click on the that particular file, it will open up and voila! I have the original word document that I downloaded.
I must have been very distracted last Friday afternoon reading TSW threads.
The worst part is that this excel file is the record of everyone's vacation time and sick time for the 2004 calendar year. And no, I didn't have it on the server. Lucky I implemented paper vacation and sick time requests so I can rebuild it.
What a blonde I am.