“There are known knowns. There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we now know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don’t know.” –Donald Rumsfeld

I never thought I’d quote Donald Rumsfeld.  At least, not in this manner.

I’ve been thinking about the real unknown unknowns; the things that we don’t know about; the everyday problems that lurk out there and we don’t realize or notice because they don’t affect us.  Some of them never come to fruition because a decision or two switches the path you’re on, saving you from disaster.  And others come to light through circumstance.  I was infertile before I knew I was infertile.  I didn’t suddenly become infertile when we tried to conceive.  I was infertile, but it was an unknown unknown until we were forced to know it.

There are thousands of moments every day when you avoid a crash that you have no clue you would have been in otherwise, or don’t have your bag stolen, or don’t meet the person you could have started a conversations with… all unknown unknowns that will always remain unrealized possibilities.

We don’t think of ourselves as lucky, even though we’ve potentially missed a host of terrible things just because don’t know what we’ve missed.  And at the same time, we don’t think of ourselves as unlucky, even though we may have missed out on absolutely fantastic things that we’ll never know about.

Something I’m mentally chewing over right now.

Our library system asks fun questions in their Facebook feed.  This week’s question: “If you were transported to the setting of your current book, where would you be? (…and what’s the name of the book!?)”

I was in Singapore because I was reading Rich People Problems by Kevin Kwan.  So much fun.  And I also found out/traveled to Palawan in that book.  So amazingly gorgeous.

Because isn’t reading a form of armchair travel?  You’re transported somewhere entirely new through the story.

I’m currently in a nameless space for The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness.  I’m a little disappointed to not have a defined setting, especially after traveling all over the globe with Kwan’s book.  I have got to go somewhere good with my next book.

Where are you traveling to right now in your book?  No book?  Then where are you traveling to in the television series you’re watching?

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

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As I said last year, Josh and I do not celebrate Valentine’s Day.  At all.  Every day is Valentine’s Day in our house.  Not that… like… I make heart-shaped pancakes all the time.  But I let everyone know how I feel every day of the year.

But what struck me this weekend was thinking about how damn important Valentine’s Day was for me back in high school or college.  If I was dating someone, I wanted to know how we were going to celebrate it.  If I wasn’t dating someone, it was a chance to get a really good mope going.  The worst was starting to date someone in January.  Was it too soon to do something for Valentine’s Day?  Would it look weird if I suggested it?

Elementary school was easy: it was class parties and paper Valentines.  But those high school and college years were a killer.

What are your Valentine’s Day memories from your teens/twenties?

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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.

It began with a call from my doctor’s office to schedule my mammogram.  My first instinct is to procrastinate, but my friend posts reminders on Facebook all the time about not putting off your annual physical or mammogram.  She was diagnosed with cancer during a routine mammogram, her life saved because she didn’t procrastinate.  So I make the appointment for the mammogram AND the physical.  I am in the adult zone.

My doctor wants me to have blood drawn before my appointment, so I take off work and go to the lab.  When I’m called back, I give the phlebotomist my usual spiel: this arm is better than the other arm, this vein is better than this one.  I apologize for my tiny, rolling veins, letting her know the best way to show them who is boss is to use a butterfly needle.

She ignores everything I tell her and insists that she knows what she’s doing.

Two needle sticks later, and it’s clear that she doesn’t know what she’s doing.

But she finally gets some blood, and I go on my way.

Days later, I’m washing the dishes and realize that I haven’t seen the test results.  They’re usually sent within 48 hours.  And I start to worry: what if the doctor isn’t releasing the test results because something is wrong with the test results?  What if she wants to tell me the results in person rather than having me read them on the screen?

So I call the lab to find out if they ran the tests and why the results haven’t been sent.  “If you don’t have them, it means your doctor hasn’t released them,” the man tells me.  I knew it!  I’m dying, and my doctor wants to be there when I hear the big news, just like my friend years ago who refused to tell me her pregnancy news via email because she “wanted to see my face.”  Seriously?  Why did she want to see me cry in jealousy?

Anyway, I’m dying.

But wait… I’m not dying.  The man checks my records and tells me that the blood tests were cancelled.  Why were the blood tests cancelled?  Because the phlebotomist didn’t draw the blood properly and it clotted.  So it was unusable.  We needed to start over.

So I went back to the lab this weekend.  And I explained what happened to the new phlebotomist.  She listened to my spiel and looked at my arm, telling me that she was going to try THE SAME THING THE OTHER WOMAN DID.  I explained how it hadn’t worked last time, and I have the bruises to prove it, and that if she would just listen to me and use a butterfly needle on the vein I’m pointing at, we’ll all be done with this in two minutes.  She takes out a large needle, insisting I’m wrong and that she has 38 years experience drawing blood.  I stand up and tell her that I am going because I have 44 years experience living in this body with these tiny, rolling baby veins and I am done being ignored.  Finished.  Beyond finished.  I don’t care about the blood test.  She can explain to my doctor why we don’t have the results.

She tells me to sit down  and takes out a butterfly need.  She doesn’t speak to me when I thank her for finally using the butterfly needle in the vein of my choosing and getting the blood easily on the first try.  30 seconds later, after thanking her for the third time and being ignored, I walk out and burst into tears in the hallway.

I go in the bathroom and have a long cry in the bathroom stall, sobbing in frustration at being ignored.  This second blood draw is the final straw in a string of upsetting encounters in a crappy week.

I decide to swing by the comic store on my way home, and I have a long conversation with the owner about various characters and series.  Finally!  A positive experience with another human being, who goes above and beyond to not only get me the comic I want, but engages in happy, geeky conversation about Mark Waid’s awesome new Doctor Strange series.  I make my purchase and thank him for turning the end of my bad week around.  I leave feeling ten times better.

Then I get home and look in the mirror while I’m washing my hands.  There is an enormous wad of toilet paper stuck to my face, and IT WAS THERE THE WHOLE TIME THAT I WAS SPEAKING TO THE OWNER OF THE COMIC BOOK STORE.  And he hadn’t said anything.  Because he’s that kind of a mensch.

Thank G-d for nice comic owners.

So remember back in December when I told you my New Year’s resolution?  I was going to spend 15 minutes every weekday morning doing something to “better” myself, and I was going to find the time by not mindlessly scrolling through Facebook?  Well, I’ve done it.  I guess I can’t really say “done” because we’re only a month into the new year, but I have completed a month + a week with gold stars.  No missed days.

It’s now a habit, and it’s my favourite habit.  It makes me feel productive, especially because I do it first thing in the morning.  I’ve managed to squeeze an extra 1 1/2 books into the first month, and it has sparked pages of ideas.  So, yeah, I’d call this one a win, even if it’s only February.

I plan on keeping this going indefinitely.

Totally easy if you want to do it, too.  Choose something you’ve been meaning to do to make yourself better.  Set aside 15 minutes every weekday morning.  Track it in a notebook or with an app.  Done — you’re like 15 minutes closer to your best you.

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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:

• “Menopause… It’s Not a Musical” (Inconceivable)
• “A Millennial and a Gen Xer Discuss Burnout” (Too Many Fish to Fry)

Okay, now my choices this week.

Infertile Fantasies posts the end of her embryo donation story.  The final transfer was cancelled; the embryo didn’t thaw.  She writes, “We are now left to navigate a new transition in our friendship with our recipients (somehow I only thought that would be a thing if the donation succeeded).”  It’s a story about endings.

Jewish IVF explains the curve her emotions go through during a cycle.  Of course, the curve doesn’t always stay the same: “Each time we lost a pregnancy, the dip went a little lower and made it harder to climb back up. Almost as though the baggage of previous losses weighed us down and helped gravity sink us even deeper.”  Which is why the curve has changed by this cycle, why it’s harder to climb back up to the peak of hope.

Infertile Phoenix has an amazing moment: her sister apologized.  She writes, “Here was my sister who was completely obsessed with her own child, almost her whole being seemed to be wrapped up in being my niece’s mother, and she could not empathize with my pain of not having children.”  A situation made her sister realize how she had potentially hurt her, and she called her with an apology.  It’s a great moment of closure.

Lastly, One Step at a Time has a beautiful post about playing the hand she was dealt after losing her husband.  Playing games with her child makes her realize that it’s the perfect opportunity to teach him that life is about continuing on.  “I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’ve been dealt a difficult situation lately. But I’m working with what I’ve got to build something new.  I’ve also learnt a lot from my son’s Monopoly ways. To invest where it brings the most returns, and not to waste time on those that don’t.”  Go read the whole thing.

The roundup to the Roundup: I’m sticking to my resolution.  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 1st and 8th) 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.