You cannot connect two copies of the same content database to a farm at
the same time. Install MOSS into a Virtual Machine, patch it to the
same level and connect the content database to that. Then use "stsadm
-o export" to export out the webs you need. Copy the files over to your
production box and run "stsadm -o import" to restore  them.

Are you saying to create a VM copy of MOSS and the content database? It
seems to me that if you can't connect two copies of a content database to
the same farm, then you can't do the reverse, either, which would be to
connect two farms to the same content database. Does this sound right?

Your production Farm will continue using the content database with the
missing/messed up site. The Farm on the VPC will be connected to the
restored content database. You then export the site  from the VPC Farm
and import it into your production Farm. Each Farm is connected to the
correct content database.

The VM that you use can be one you create on your own, or you can even
download a premade one from Microsoft here,
www.microsoft.com/.../details.aspx

In short, the production farm is connected to the running production
version of the ContentDB.

The VM farm is connected to the _restored_ version of the ContentDB.
Both farms are using different instances of the same ContentDB.

I did come accross this posting from Blog on something similar to what i was having a problem with see below.

--- begin post -- taken from
mindsharpblogs.com/.../2817.aspx

Partially restore  Sites

Haven't blogged in a while... did you miss me?

I was working with a customer a while back that had several hundred
various objects deleted from a site  Collection (sitecollection1).
Their question was "Can I restore only the objects that were deleted".
They were told 'no' by their local admins. No fault of theirs, but let
me show you how this is accomplished:

1. Restore the content database, to an alternate farm,that hosted the
before-mentioned site collection. if you don't know, this can be found
from Central Administration, Application Management, Site collection  List.

2. Browse to http://alternatewebapp/sites/sitecollection1

3. From the command line, stsadm.exe -o export -url
http://alternatewebapp/sites/sitecollection1 -filename c:\filename.bak
-includeusersecurity -versions 4

3a. If you haven't already done so, you need to run an stsadm.exe -o
setproperty -pn max-template-document-size -pv 500000 to raise the
default max size from 10MB.

4. Copy the backup  file from step 3. to your production server

5. stsadm.exe -o import -url
http://productionwebapp/sites/sitecollection1 -filename
c:\filename.bak -includeusersecurity -updateversions 3

The '3' could be replaced with any of the following:

-updateversions
1 - Add new versions to the current file (default)
2 - Overwrite the file and all its versions (delete then insert)
3 - Ignore the file if it exists on the destination]

Please not that 'sitecollection' was a typo. Should have been 'site'.
There is a hosting site  collection, but you can only import | export a
site.

I contacted Microsoft about this and it turns out there is a hotfix.
Which worked perfectly until. i had to run the sharepoint  services
config wizard. The central admin site  is now down. the mysites are
also down and another site collection  is down. yeah!!

So i recovered my missing site but lost other sites. fun fun fun.

So my follow up question is how do i restore  the central admin site.
I am being told by microsoft that i have to create a new centraldb
and connect to that one but any custom templates will be lost.
Anyone have any other alternatives.

running WSS3, Windows 2003. 64 bit WFEs and sql  2005 backend.

Central Admin site  can be restored using the SharePoint Products and
Technologies configuration wizard.