While there are many bad uses of AI, and I feel a strong sense of relief that I grew up before a world where everyone had a camera with unlimited “film” in their pocket, I think this use of AI is touching and beautiful.

The person is using AI to try to re-create images of childhood memories from her grandparent’s house. And while I clearly wasn’t there, they look real.

She writes, “I’ve been really intrigued by the process — because it feels exactly like trying to describe an experience to a child, exactly how you remember it, who can grasp the vague lines of what you’re picturing but has no life context and is imagining something slightly tangential in real time…”

There are moments I wish I could see again or show to someone else, but they only exist in my head because we didn’t have a camera then. Sometimes technology is good.

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

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I saw this on Facebook, and it was such a good idea — like the fish doorbell — that I had to put it here, too. I took a screenshot in case you don’t have a Facebook account and can’t see the post.

Isn’t that such an intelligent use of technology? It collects data by encouraging what people are already doing (taking a picture) but making it do double-duty as both capturing the scenery and charting change.

So smart.

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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.

During Kindergarten orientation night, someone called our kids the Class of 2023, and I thought to myself how hard August 2023 would be. Thank G-d it was so far away.

But now it is here. The final month. The final weeks. Really, we’re down to the final days.

It is so weird to dread a month for so long. An event, yes. But a month — to have a date in your head for over a decade — is another story. You can see how far away it is on a calendar and watch it inch closer and closer until you are inside that calendar page. Inside those 31 days.

The mornings are the hardest. I have a few seconds when I wake up while my brain is untangling, and then I remember. And I feel so overwhelmingly sad. The nights are hard, too, when I’m about to go to bed, and I have time to think about it. The rest of the day is filled with work and distractions and tasks.

Apologies. I only have one thing to say lately.

The ChickieNob asked a great question at dinner this week: Which favourite food would you never eat again if you were told you had to give it up? You couldn’t cheat and name something you didn’t really love. You had to take one of your favourites and say goodbye forever.

The Wolvog had a hundred questions (“Would I have to watch other people eat it?”) and tried to choose something that definitely wasn’t a beloved food. I said goodbye to mashed potatoes. I love them, but I love pasta more.

What would you give up?

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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:

• “The Grass  Is Not Always Greener” (No Kidding in NZ)

Okay, now my choices this week.

AndMom returns! She tells us what has been happening for the last 1,237 days, voicing her frustration with a world that has moved on from the pandemic when her family cannot.”No one will be careful for us – or themselves. I have spent the past 3 years reading the studies, looking for any evidence that we’re overreacting. Looking for a reason to loosen up. After all, everyone else has. But all I see is more and more evidence that I don’t want this virus.” Me too. Which is why we still mask.

Lastly, FinallyMyLinesNow is also back with an update about her childcare nightmare. Like this gem: “She arrived. On day 4 she informed us she’d lied about all of her experience and she left, stealing our towels, picture frames, and toiletries on her way out. We were once again sans childcare.” Illness also rocked the family, and you can see how tiny moments add up to huge issues that impact every facet of the day. It’s a good reminder that we never know what someone else is dealing with beyond what we see.

The roundup to the Roundup: Foods on the imaginary chopping block. 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 28 – August 4) 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.

The ChickieNob was going to the Barbie movie with a friend, and I was going to dinner with a friend a block away, so they caught a ride with me. It was nice to drive with kids in the car again.

After the movie, I asked them about that line that keeps getting repeated on social media: “We mothers stand still, so our daughters can look back to see how far they’ve come.” It’s obviously about the individual journey: letting go of your parents’ hands and walking forward on your own path. It hits close to home right now. But it led to a conversation about how each generation becomes defined and the next one moves forward, defining itself.

And I pointed out that they are the first generation I can think of that have it worse than their mothers.

It was easier for my generation than my mother’s generation. We could get a credit card in our name and have legal, safe abortion. Just to name two things. They nodded, and her friend said, “Well, yeah. That.” But the more significant thing was that we had true freedom in that I could go where I wanted to go and do what I wanted to do. If those moments were documented at all, they were solely for the pleasure of the people in the group and lived on in paper photos or scraps of paper.

I’m not saying that people never endured their worst moments living on forever, but the scope of the damage was fairly small. A circle of friends. A town. I was free to make decisions and not think about how they may be interpreted a year, five years, or ten years down the road. No one knew what I looked like unless they met me or a mutual friend showed them a picture. I knew — pretty much — who knew me. Or knew of me.

That’s the thing about letting go of someone’s hand and moving forward. Are you free to become yourself — to find yourself with mistakes and all — if you trade your parents’ watchful eyes for the watchful eyes of smartphones and CCTV?

It was food for thought.