iPod recovery

So this is a two part question. Recently my iPod (set to "disk mode") was hooked up to my new MacBook.. I deleted all music, NOT videos though, off it. I was halfway through transferring the music from my new computer when iTunes would not respond. I force quit but the application was still open and would not force quit even with command-option-escape. I had to hard shut down my computer, but now every time I connect my iPod to my computer iTunes will not respond. This is my first question - what can I do to remedy this?
The second question is that shortly after I was trying to connect it and it seems to have restored to factory settings. I have lost the movies that I spend hours and hours ripping with HandBrake. This is a great pain as I really wanted to have them on Saturday, when I am driving to San Francisco - a 20 hour drive, and when I'm not at the wheel I'd love to be watching some videos.
How can I recover the videos I've lost? I'm sure they haven't been secure-deleted from the iPod - it's just the paths that have been deleted.
I'd really appreciate your help on this.
Thanks
cangoalie

If they were on iTunes, you should be able to get them back from your iTunes folder in Finder. Look in the "All Movies" folder, see if they're there.

Yes, obviously I realize that. The reason the iPod was on disk mode was so that I could store the movies on the iPod only and not the hard drive.

I should maybe mention that I just upgraded to the latest version of iTunes 7.x and it's now saying that it can't read the contents of the iPod.