I used to have a glorious box of ram, spare drives, and every cable and adapter imaginable.
My box also mysteriously disappeared some time after I got married. I feel your pain :)
I recall at one job we had very long runs of rs232 cables to some vt100's which where very sensitive to electrical charges.
To the point where one of our electronics shop brought the official Vt100 manuals so they could repair any blown chips.
DEC field circus loved us :-) It was the 11/03 covered I black coal dust that really upset them.
Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if we didn't already have kids.
My box of concert tickets from every show I ever saw disappeared.
I'm just saying, this is not normal or acceptable behaviour.