691st Friday Blog Roundup

I am still riding the energy of the read-a-thon.  I only managed to complete one of the books (Hello, Sunshine) because there were many pauses to muse on the state of Kate’s uterus and its inhabitant.  I moved the read-a-thon to the beach because… I mean… it’s the beach.  But the ChickieNob was very concerned that she would miss the royal birth.  We compromised by bringing my laptop on the off-chance that she delivered while we were read-a-thoning, though we didn’t need to turn it on because she delivered on Monday.

So we swam in the hotel pool and ate a lot of ice cream.  We parked the car facing the ocean and read inside with the windows cracked so the wind streamed through.  We stopped early one night and went to see A Wrinkle in Time.  We rode our bikes around the nature reserve, stopping for fifteen minutes to observe an animal that looked like a woodchuck with a long rat tail, swimming down a stream.  We played with the hotel owner’s ponies.

I was able to ride that reading energy into the week and made a dent in Jasper Fforde’s Shades of Grey.  (Liking it a lot so far, Jenny!).  I needed a weekend like that.  I’d like to have more weekends like that, with Josh joining us so he can do the ice cream runs.  Just the beach and books and nowhere we have to be.

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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:

• None… sniff.

Okay, now my choices this week.

Manapan’s Space has a brilliant post playing off the Welcome to Holland essay to explain her child’s diagnosis.  She points out: “What nobody ever seems to reference, however, is having a child with hidden disabilities.”  Please go over and give her support.

Bereaved and Blessed marks the ten year anniversary of Molly’s birth and death by revisiting the CarePage from that time.  The site is shutting down, and it compiled her posts into a 199 page PDF.  She writes: “I’ve re-read what I shared about our journey with Molly many times over the past 10 years, but not as much as I did today in a while and not the specific comments we got on my posts from those who followed and supported us on our CarePage.  It was surreal, painful and affirming.”  It’s a must-read post about why we write; why it is so important to record life.

NotMyLinesYet has a post about her inner monologue stuck on a loop.  She explains: “Lately, I’ve realized that my inner monologue has lost its utility and become focused on loss and infertility. The words ‘7 pregnancies, 8 babies, no living children’ just keep swirling around. I’m concerned that this is becoming how I define myself.”  I love her redirection exercise for getting her mind onto other aspects of self.

Lastly, Laughing is Conceivable has a post about NIAW and this year’s theme: “flip the script,” which has long been used by the adoption community.  It’s sort of a strange theme because no one has been speaking for infertile people (more like ignoring infertile people), so there isn’t really a script to flip?  Anyway, she brilliantly points out that it’s important to have the script fit your needs.  Telling people because you need people to hear it. (Or not telling because you don’t.)

The roundup to the Roundup: Trying to hold onto the read-a-thon feelings.  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 April 20th and 27th) 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.