558th Friday Blog Roundup

Truman is doing much better, though the vet ruled that he needs to be on antibiotics for another two weeks.

He was so happy in the car as we drove to the vet, squeaking along to Paul McCartney.  Maybe he thought we were going to the store where we buy his cookies.  But then we walked into the office and he immediately looked at me with terror, as if to say, “Crap!  This place!  Where they squeeze me for an x-ray?”  He went back to being his chill self the moment we got back outside, and he squeaked with ABBA the whole ride home.

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The twins completed the library’s summer reading program and got a free book as a result.  Even though there were no prizes for adults, we were invited to participate, too.  So I’ve been logging my summer reading with the library and got a virtual sticker every time I completed two books.

Um, I really like the stickers.

I remember when we were little that the impetus to do summer reading was that the library would put your name up around the information desk.  There was usually a theme to the program, and the name card was in a special shape.  Once summer was over, you could go by the library and get your name card, but it was a big deal to go to the library and see everyone’s name.  I was the sort of child who needed to go frequently to check my own.

I wish my local library would put my name up at the desk and let people know that I’m doing their summer reading program.  I would like everyone in my town to know that Melissa is feverishly reading books.

But, you know, they don’t have the children’s names up so it would probably be odd if they only had a middle-aged woman’s name scrawled across a beach-ball-shaped name card at the information desk.

Right?

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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 in order to find out about methods, plug-ins, and devices that help you quickly back up your data and accounts.

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And now the blogs…

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

• “Returning” (Schrodinger’s Catbox)
• “Microblog Monday: Infertility Is…” (Searching for Our Silver Lining)
• “On Being Invisible” (When You Can’t Have Kids)

Okay, now my choices this week.

I love this post by Bereaved and Blessed about getting a sign from her daughter, Molly.  A notification pops up that happens to be from someone with the same name as the daughter they lost years ago.  After a moment of sleep confusion, she realizes that it’s the name of a distant connection.  She writes, “However, it was nice, if even for a moment, to believe that our baby girl wants us to know how she feels about her siblings.”  I like the idea of people being able to communicate with us from worlds beyond.

It Is What It Is (or Is It?) has a tribute to the brother she lost in a car accident when they were children.  It is such a gorgeous post.  The two parts that got under my skin were her musings about all that would be different if not for the accident (“I can’t even conjure who that eleven year old girl would have grown up to be. She is a ghost.”) and the moving conclusion to the post (“And so, it is on this day, brother, a day where I miss you profoundly, that I say thank you.“).

Lastly, A Separate Life has a post about breathing in a moment.  It’s a day when she rightfully could feel otherwise.  She explains, “I can look out the window at my 270 degree view, and take it in, feel gratitude on a day when I don’t really want to feel grateful, and have the comfort of knowing you are all with me on this late winter Wellington morning.”  She finds a small space to be still on the heels of bad news, and she captures the moment perfectly in a beautiful post.

The roundup to the Roundup: Truman is doing better.  I did the library’s summer reading program.  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 August 7th and 14th) 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.