According to Forbes, 49.53% of US households have dogs (65.1 million out of 131.43 total US households). So, almost half of US households. Every dog I know (and apparently about 50% of dogs, total) is terrified of fireworks. So why do towns and individuals insist on setting off multiple nights of fireworks, terrorizing animals and humans with the noise? It is a bizarre equation: We have X + we know Y terrifies X = we do Y. And we don’t do Y once. We do Y every night for four or five nights in a row.

I do not have a dog, but I have a Facebook feed full of people writing posts about how their dog had to live in a thundershirt all week. Do dog owners set off fireworks? Or are all firework setter-offers part of that 50.47% of non-dog owners who seemingly have no clue how the noise impacts the animals and humans around them? This is a mystery I’d like to solve.

Beorn was fine early on. He was awake but laying down beside me. But at the end when they set off the grand finale a few blocks away? He jumped up and started shaking so I gave him his hiding house. He turned it so he could watch me while inside it. And he stayed in there for about two hours.

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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.

Middle Girl has a tiny, quote-y post. In a world that seems keen to distract you both from sitting and thinking, this Lorraine Hansberry quote and her accompanying beautiful image will make you… sit and think.

Lastly, Finding a Different Path has a good reminder that when the world gives you a break, take it. Don’t fill it as if you’re not on a break. Instead, use the time to recharge and order an awesome photo cover planner.

The roundup to the Roundup: Who sets off fireworks? 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 June 28 – July 5) 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 do not have Fourth of July plans, and I’m totally fine with that. We could go to the fireworks, have people over, or go to the pool, but we’re not making the most of the long weekend. We’re not really doing anything exciting at all.

I read an essay a few weeks ago about Boring Girl Summer, and I loved it because it raises a fair point: who decided that summer has to be fun? I like winter and cold weather more than summer, and plans do not always equal excitement. The writer lives close to the beach, so they have a built-in activity, but I will definitely be joining her with this: “Lounge in the backyard and read while you drink homemade iced tea sweetened with local honey.”

You can read anywhere. And not make plans anywhere. And wander around a farmers market anywhere. And make a meal entirely out of things you find at the farmers market wherever you live. That’s what I plan to do with this weekend.

When we were first married, we had a lot of dinner parties. They weren’t potlucks — I did all of the cooking — but they weren’t sit-at-the-table parties because we only had four chairs. And they were all metal folding chairs. People plopped down on the sofa or the floor with their plates, and we’d hang out all night, eating and listening to music and talking.

Then we moved to a different place, and we held one or two of those old-style, sit-on-the-floor dinners in our basement. But at some point, we graduated to a smaller group—usually just a handful of people—all around the table. I came to think of the floor dinners as part of new adulthood and the table dinners as part of being a grownup.

The dinner parties dried up entirely during COVID and haven’t returned.

I miss those dinner parties on the floor. Watching where you stepped so you didn’t knock over a glass. People constantly shifting to a new space and talking to a new person when they returned from refilling their plate. I don’t know why I ever thought the floor wasn’t grownup.

Dinner parties are the thing I miss the most from pre-COVID.

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

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It started with one suggested calligraphy video in my Instagram feed. A disembodied hand was showing how to create illuminated letters. I watched it, and the next day, three calligraphy videos were in my feed. And for days after, a third of my feed was disembodied hands creating gorgeous letters.

And then came the embroidery videos. One was mixed in with the calligraphy videos, and within a day, the calligraphy videos were replaced with embroidery videos. There were embroidered flowers on jeans, embroidered designs on collars, and nimble disembodied hands showing me how to create seven different kinds of knots in thread.

I’m not sure what they’ll deliver next or if I’ll be stuck with embroidery videos for a long time because I bookmarked them, intending to return to them when I purchased some thread and could try out the knots myself.

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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.

Yesterday was lördagsgodis in Sweden, a weekly custom known as “Saturday Candy.” Food and Wine explains: “Every weekend, children and adults alike spend part of their Saturdays cozy at home, eating through an assortment of their favorite candies.” You build anticipation during the week and go all-in on Saturday.

A quick Google search brings you IKEA’s offerings, a BBC article, and an Etsy shop dedicated to the tradition.

ChickieNob and I have something similar on Fridays that I started years ago. We take a mid-day break (either together or in our own space when she is at college), eat a few squares of chocolate, and watch a few minutes of a favourite television show. Doing it during a workday as the lunch break feels a little more decadent than Saturdays, which are already exciting because you’re off work. But I like the idea of an entire country taking a candy break at the same time.