I warned you that it was coming and gave you homework. It’s the 16th anniversary of the Friday Blog Roundup, and to celebrate, I asked you to find two posts: (1) one of yours that I highlighted here that you also love and (2) someone else’s post (from any time period) that you think everyone should read. So drop them in the comment section below. As well as anything else you’ve loved from the last four weeks.

Thank you for being here weekly. This ongoing series has framed my week for 16 years, and I’m grateful for all of your posts.

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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:

• “Gone” (The Barreness)
• “Losses and Last Resorts” (No Kidding in NZ)
• “Happy 31st birthday, sLOVEnia!” (The Next 15000 Days)
• “Hello, Summer!” (Finding a Different Path)

Okay, now my choices this week.

A bunch of longtime voices have returned.

Much Ado About Nothing has an update. She left her job for a new one that appreciates what she brings. She writes, “I know what my experience is worth, and I demanded it. I went in like a badass version of myself I haven’t felt like in a long while, and I refused to be nervous and intimidated.” I love that.

Are You Kidding Me is back — same site though the blog has a new name: Dear John. She is writing letters to her husband who died earlier this year. They are raw and moving and her latest one made me sit still for a few minutes after reading. She is selling her husband’s things, and she writes: “It’s so difficult to give up your stuff. I don’t want it here any more, but it feels like letting you go too soon. You don’t need the stuff, and you would definitely be in favor of getting rid of it. But it makes me cry.” Abide with her.

Lastly, My Lady of the Lantern returned to close her blog. She explains: “I have never wanted to abandon a blog without telling that I was going to abandon it. I found it irksome when some of my favourites just stopped posting one day, and then never returned. And I don’t want to do the same. So as of today, I think I can safely say that I no longer feel the urge to blurb here.” I’m grateful for the closure and the final thoughts.

The roundup to the Roundup: It’s the 16th anniversary of the Friday Blog Roundup. 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 24 – July 22) 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.

Every ten years, for Josh’s birthday, we do the same(ish) trip to the UK. The twins came on the last one when he turned 40, but I realized when they were born that they would be in late high school when our trip for his 50th rolled around. I dreamed that we’d do a three-day walk into Canterbury, reading Chaucer along the way.

But then COVID happened.

And the company that ran the three-day walk shut down.

And we weren’t certain we should go on the trip at all, especially since we hadn’t left home in years due to the pandemic. But we talked it out and decided that we were all okay with the restrictions we’d need to put in place (masks, takeaway meals in parks or in the hotel room, curtailed plans) to make the trip happen. So we stuck with our tradition and hit the UK for Josh’s 50th.

One afternoon, the ChickieNob and I Googled how long it would take to go from London to Paris on the Eurostar. It was too far for a day trip, but as we played on the site we discovered that Brussels was only two hours from London. We started campaigning for day trip to Brussels, which became a family joke for a few days.

Until Josh bought the Eurostar tickets and we were locked into a 7 am train to Belgium. Which meant we needed to leave our hotel at 5 am to get to the station on time. Suddenly it didn’t seem quite as funny.

But it turned out to be one of the best days of the trip. Not just the endless waffles or stocking up on French books. We did very little research before we left, so we spent the day wandering up and down streets, poking into cathedrals and parks, and just watching the city unfold in front of us. As someone who overplans, it was a nice change to have a day somewhere unknown with no agenda.

We somewhat spontaneously took a trip to Europe. Everything the newspapers say is true and NOT true at the same time. We ended up having a relatively uneventful trip after a lot of worrying, but your mileage may vary.

Check Your Flight

We made a flight. We congratulated ourselves. We planned the trip. Six days before we were set to leave, we checked our flight due to all of the news articles out there about canceled flights. And ours had a big, red canceled notice on it. No one notified us. If we hadn’t checked, we would not have known this was the case. So first bit of advice: check your flights daily leading up to the trip, and keep up with the news for where you’re going. We also checked our return flight every day of the trip, but that one remained scheduled. Huge sigh of relief.

Things Will Take a Long Time

Or maybe they won’t. But go into it thinking it will take a long time. We downloaded a few audiobooks for stories I already knew by heart. This gave me something to listen to while we were in line or waiting. Choosing something happy that didn’t tax my brain gave me an opportunity to mentally escape. Things we thought would go quickly didn’t. Things we thought would take a long time didn’t. You never know.

Travel Insurance

We were probably able to keep calm in some situations knowing that we had travel insurance. Even if you don’t end up needing it, it’s well worth the cost for the peace of mind.

Think Before You Pack

Pack as much as you can in carry on. We packed a lot of our clothes in carry on, and anything that would be difficult not to have for the first few days. Bring extra medications in case you get stuck. We had watched friends deal with missing luggage via stories on Facebook, and we saw the pictures of Heathrow with the suitcases piled up. We made a spreadsheet of everything packed and took photos so we knew which bag contained which items. We also made an audio recording as we packed, talking out what was in each suitcase. We didn’t end up needing these photos and audio files, but they would have been handy to have if things didn’t work out.

Fly Direct

If you can, fly direct. Every story I hear about missing luggage includes a connecting flight.

BYOM

Bring your own masks and tests. We masked everywhere — any time we were outside the hotel room, including outside while we walked around. (Yes, we have lovely mask tans.) We didn’t eat at restaurants. We brought our own breakfast and lunch and did takeaway for dinner. It worked well because the weather was nice. We brought tiny crackers and granola bars for the flight that we could eat without removing our masks. We brought reusable straws and a sponge so we could drink without removing our masks. We took COVID seriously because it’s still serious. No one gave us grief for wearing a mask or looked at us strangely, but only 10 – 20% of people were still masking. We came home COVID-free, though we’re continuing to test.

Buy Tickets Beforehand

Even better, if you’re going to multiple sites, see if they’re connected by a common membership pass. We were able to get a year membership to one place that allowed us to enter five different museums/sites. This gave us a place to call if we were having trouble getting in that day. Plus we got perks such as going back to the Tower at night for the Ceremony of the Keys, which was held for members only.

That’s all the advice I have to give. Would we do it again? Probably. If we hadn’t purchased the tickets before everything started to go downhill, we probably would have delayed the trip. But once we had the tickets, we decided to go full-steam-ahead and we’re glad we went. Even happier that things worked out and we’re home again.

Our heart goes out to people weathering the heat wave right now. We had warm days while we were there, but nothing like what is going on right now.

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

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This is the 400th Microblog Monday. So… it’s been going for 7.6 years. A baby in comparison to the Friday Blog Roundup, which will soon reach its 16th anniversary and has over 800 posts. But still worth noting because the Internet is all about brief rises and falls. People start projects and end them. Something gets hot and then it’s not. But Microblog Monday has been trucking along, unchanged, for 400 posts. It’s small, barely used anymore, but still here.

Thank you for blogging, too.

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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 that are connected to businesses or are sponsored post.

I don’t know if this is true, but if it is, I kind of love the idea of randomly ringing a phone and talking to whoever had the curiosity to pick up.

020 7930 1397

This is the number for this phonebox on Parliament Square. There’s normally a queue of tourists waiting to get a photograph with it, so give it a call sometime. Who knows who you might speak to. pic.twitter.com/1Asxpozx0V

— Nick Walker (@nickw84) May 21, 2022

Anyone in the UK want to try this?