Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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I am normally not a fan of games with timers. Even if I tell myself that I won’t care about time, I still care about time. I try to work quickly. Or I cheat and turn off the phone to think. In any case, I usually click away the moment I see a timer that I cannot turn off in settings.

But I like 18 words because the timer doesn’t feel unreasonable. I’m not working frantically. It’s just trying to get me to focus. The timer resets with each word, and you rarely need more than 30 seconds per word. If you mess up one word, the game doesn’t stop. You keep your place and try again.

18 words is a gentle word unscrambling game, perfect for even people who dislike timers.

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts connected to businesses or sponsored posts.

I found a Moomin cruise that goes between Helsinki and Stockholm, and told everyone about it while I was making breakfast. The ChickieNob commented that seeing as she gets seasick easily, feeling queasy while surrounded by Moomin murals did not sound appealing, and Josh said, “What are Moomins?”

ChickieNob and I didn’t believe him, but his brain has somehow blocked out all things Moomin. Hippo-looking things? Vaguely problematic at times? All of it seems like a fever dream?

We found him a playlist with 78 episodes, as well as the books at the library.

For your viewing pleasure.

Welcome back, Ted Lasso. I don’t care if the first episode was a little rough around the edges. It will get better, and I got to see my tv friends again. I didn’t just feel weepy. I got weepy. I cried seeing all of them in Kansas City, even if that is not how people make job offers.

We went to Richmond during our last trip to London so we could walk the waterfront, and I also got choked up seeing Ted’s street, the bench, and the pub. We went into a pop-up shop selling Ted Lasso souvenirs, and when I turned around, I saw they had placed the Believe sign above the door.

Sometimes the world feels so hard, and it’s just nice to have something out there that reminds you to also notice the good. Thanks, Ted.

Who else is watching?

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Stop procrastinating. Go make your backups. Don’t have regrets.

Seriously. Stop what you’re doing for a moment. It will take you fifteen minutes, tops. But you will have peace of mind for days and days. It’s the gift to yourself that keeps on giving.

As always, add any new thoughts to the Friday Backup post and peruse new comments to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

And now the blogs…

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But first, second, helpings of the posts that appeared in the open comment thread last week. To read the description before clicking over, please return to the open thread:

• None… sniff.

Okay, now my choices this week.

Infertile Phoenix writes about feeling drained. This spoke to me deeply: “How does anyone get anything done? What is this world that we have created? I keep thinking how dumb and impossible it all is. I’m usually pretty positive. But I’m also very real.” Things feel unfamiliar for her, but she’s rolling with it and figuring it out.

Lastly, Finding a Different Path writes about the feelings that bubble up when you fill out medical paperwork. All past surgeries? She explains: “I started just lumping 2010-2015 together, because of all the hysteroscopies, egg retrievals, and the pericentesis when I had OHSS. It hurts less that way.” Here’s to deactivating your own grief bombs. (And glad you found a good PT situation.)

The roundup to the Roundup: New Ted Lasso season. Your weekly backup nudge. And lots of great posts to read. So what did you find this week? Please use a permalink to the blog post (written between July 31 – August 7) and not the blog’s main URL. Not understanding why I’m asking you what you found this week. Read the original open thread post here.

We have a favourite restaurant in London that we go to at least once, but usually several times each trip, depending on the length of the trip. At the end of the final meal, we split a plate of tiramisu. We take a photo of the piece of cake with four forks, and then the empty plate with the four forks. I have so many of these photos.

But it occurred to me that I could make tiramisu. And then not just have one slice, but make myself ill eating as much tiramisu as I wished.

ChickieNob and I set out using this recipe, mostly because it didn’t contain eggs and seemed super simple. And it was. It was a really easy recipe if you have a stand mixer. The only change I made was to use iced coffee instead of espresso.

We didn’t even need to wait to try it. We took leftover lady fingers, dipped them in the leftover coffee, and then smeared up the leftover mascarpone cream. It was so good. Even with the lady fingers still a little crunchy.

Some people have shared this video expressing sadness over the way we spend our time, but I’m not sure why we feel activities need to remain the same. I mean, sure it’s a little depressing to see sex fall off the screen, but for every loss (hanging out with friends) you also see a smaller amount of time devoted to activities that used to eat up much of our day (housework).

Also, this is the collective trend, not the personal trend. In my own world, I read for more than two hours per day. On the weekend, that number is much higher. I don’t need anyone else to spend the same amount of time I do on that activity as long as I can spend that time on that activity.

And take all of it with a grain of salt. Sleeping doesn’t feature on this 24 hour list. Or bathing. Or getting dressed. There are a lot of time-consuming activities missing from this list.