882nd Friday Blog Roundup

I have the saddest discontinued product story. I once bought a box of Wilhelmina mints on impulse when we were checking out of Trader Joe’s, simply because it had a picture of Queen Wilhelmina on the box, and I thought the ChickieNob would like it. Fast forward to today, and all four of us are addicted to these mints. We go through so many boxes per month.

We were running low, so Josh and I ran out to Trader Joe’s where there were zero boxes in stock. Panicking, we went home and looked online to see if we could order them. There were two versions — a blue box that is not vegan and a white box that is vegan. We ordered 12 of the white boxes and waited for our shipment of mints. Crisis averted.

OR SO WE THOUGHT.

The box arrived filled with the non-vegan version. We were able to get our money refunded, but poking around the internet, we discovered that our mint has been discontinued. They’re still making the non-vegan version with gelatin, but they are no longer making the kind stamped vegan.

It’s a heart breaker.

We’re currently sampling vegan mints from various stores, trying to find one that makes us happy. Perhaps not as happy as the vegan Wilhelminas but happy enough. The candy world is a hard space for vegans.

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Speaking of creating things, Life from Scratch is still on sale. Just 99 cents. Tell your friends, tell your family, tell your neighbours. Buy a copy for everyone you know and love.

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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.

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And now the blogs…

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.

Finding a Different Path has a story about her recent mammogram. (Asking a fantastic question: “Why must everything women’s health be squashing and poking and stretching and undignified?“) But moreover, it was a great moment where a conversation that could have gone sideways stayed on course and the technician said (or didn’t say) all the right things. Here’s to good mammograms. (Or, at the very least, not bad mammograms.)

Infertile Phoenix rested in January. She writes: “Who cares, I keep reminding myself. It’s a pandemic. It’s burnout. It’s existential fatigue. Who cares about my made up plans for myself. There is no To Do list police.” She is still processing her CNBC story, and it’s a good life, she reminds herself. I liked this quiet, snowy post.

Lastly, the pandemic has gotten us thinking about our social networks. The Road Less Travelled loops through this topic, too, pointing out that even having family nearby doesn’t necessarily buffer you completely. COVID has interrupted our social lives and all the channels we would have tried to make connections. It’s an interesting topic, and everyone has a slightly different take as they look at their surroundings.

The roundup to the Roundup: No more mints. Life from Scratch is on sale. 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 February 4 – 11) 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.