I am smitten with Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore.  I’m halfway through, and it is the best mental sorbet before bed to clear my mind from the day’s news.  I feel like one of you recommended this to me, but I can’t find the comment anymore.  So… thank you to the wonderful person who recommended this book.  It is totally and completely enjoyable.  And it is exactly what I need.

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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:

• None… sniff…

Okay, now my choices this week.

It’s Inconceivable has a post about the intersection of work and loss.  She writes, “We hear so much about the struggles of women with children juggling work and their family commitments … What of those of us who have had numerous losses or loss of hopes and aspirations of a family, or juggling the rollercoaster that is infertility treatment in the world of work?”  It is such an important and interesting conversation.

Baby Ridley Bump is processing her recent loss after the D&C.  She is raw: “All I can think about is how I am supposed to be pregnant right now.  How our baby shared it’s due date with my husband’s birthday, how everything seemed to be meant to be and aligned so perfectly, yet it was taken away so quickly.  I’ve been crying all week at work and I am still just so unbelievably sad about it.”  It is a post about the difference between a physical recovery and an emotional recovery, and how each unfolds at its own pace.

Lastly, Non Sequitur Chica had a post last week (but I read it this week when I was catching up in my feedreader) about seeing Michelle Obama.  With pictures!  But the interesting part is that Obama explained why she didn’t talk about IVF while she was in the White House.  “So while she is happy to be open about IVF, going through marriage counseling, etc. now she didn’t really think that it was appropriate to talk about it while she was in the White House. There were so many other things going on at the time, she didn’t want to be a distraction.”  I’ve been seeing a lot of people discuss her timing and how it would have made a difference if she had talked about it in the White House.  I don’t think one person can change public opinion like that, so that burden shouldn’t be placed on her shoulders.  But it is interesting to consider what people choose to use their platform to get people thinking about.

The roundup to the Roundup: Love Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore.  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 November 16th and November 23rd) 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.

Sometimes you see a word once, and then you see it again and again in various places.  Wabi-sabi is one of those words, and it seems like a perfect one to trot out today.  I’ve read a bit about it, and my understanding of the concept probably doesn’t do it justice.  But I’ll place it out there just in case it speaks to you the same way it speaks to me.

The concept centers on the idea of finding beauty in the “imperfect.”  Or, as Utne Reader explains:

Wabi-sabi reminds us that we are all transient beings on this planet—that our bodies, as well as the material world around us, are in the process of returning to dust. Nature’s cycles of growth, decay, and erosion are embodied in frayed edges, rust, liver spots. Through wabi-sabi, we learn to embrace both the glory and the melancholy found in these marks of passing time.

Thanksgiving is a way I mark time.  It’s not the holiday itself, but I’m usually with family, and it makes me fretful because I can see time passing.  The kids don’t look like they did five Thanksgivings ago.  The world feels different from it did ten Thanksgivings ago.  But I also love this day that makes me a little melancholy.  Hours spent with people I love, eating the side dishes and too much dessert.

That’s beautiful, too.

I hope you are having a great day doing whatever you do to celebrate (or not celebrate) Thanksgiving.

[Melissa stands up, taps her fork against her glass, and clears her throat. The conversation around the table dies down. She looks at everyone at the table.]

We do this every year: Come together as a community and have a virtual meal before we scatter to our actual meals. Unless, that is, you do not celebrate Thanksgiving. But I hope that you’ll join the table for virtual food and company even if you don’t follow this tradition offline.

We’ve virtually eaten together since 2009. That’s when this tradition began. There are some people hurting at this table. For some people, this pre-meal is what gets them through their real meal later in the week. People have written that they’ve printed out this yearly post and comments and left the paper in their purse because it helped to have a tangible reminder that there were people out there who got it. Who weren’t going to ask them when they were going to hurry up and have children. Who weren’t going to cringe when someone spoke the name of a child they lost.

We are all so different. All of us. Around this table. But we have this one facet of our lives — and yes, even though it may be a big, overpowering one for you right now, it is only one facet of who you are — where we overlap: infertility or adoption or loss. And I am so thankful, so grateful, that I found all of you. Everyone needs a You-shaped space where they can be themselves. And that’s what I have here.

So every year, I ask people to bring a virtual dish to our meal. Place it in the comment section, explaining what you brought and why. And say anything else you need to say before sitting back down to enjoy the company. Update about where you are; your emotional state.

We’re an international group, hailing from countries all around the world. So while Thanksgiving is an American tradition, I hope that everyone around the world feels as if they can participate. (Especially our Canadian neighbours who celebrated Thanksgiving weeks ago.) I’d love for your dish to come from your culture or country. Don’t worry about the contents on the table clashing.

I am bringing stuffing. It’s comfort food; mushy and soggy and warm.

So what did you bring and what do you want to say to the community?

And please, start eating as everyone is introducing their dish. We don’t want the food to get cold and there are so many of us at this table. Thank you so much for coming, and I’m going to carry the warmth of this meal with me for the rest of this week.

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

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While we’re on the topic of other places (at least, we were yesterday), I was cracking up over this Business Insider post of 24 things that are normal in the US but weird to the rest of the world.

There are some that I find weird, too.  Why is our money all one colour?  But a chunk of the other ones didn’t seem (1) unique to the US or (2) something widespread in the US.

We’ve tipped in every country we’ve ever visited.  Not as Americans acting American, but because there was a note on the receipt about leaving a tip.  That’s what bathroom stalls have looked like in many public places around the world.  And enormous portions have been the norm every place I’ve traveled — from hole-in-the-wall restaurants in small towns in the Middle East to restaurants in European capital cities.  On the other hand, while I’ve certainly seen Solo cups used at parties, it’s more plastic cups in general.  People are happy to use blue ones or clear ones or red ones.  I’m not sure where they only use red Solo cups in the US.

But the ice thing.  Yeah, we love our ice.

What do you think of the list?

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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.

Yes, I needed to scream that title.

I didn’t know when the mail carrier handed me the little package that my heart was forever going to live outside my chest in book form.  People, I am in love with dwarsliggers.

My sister saw them at a bookstore and surprised me with the only John Green book I haven’t read: Looking for Alaska.

She sent it without letting me know, so I was completely shocked when I opened the package and found a tiny book inside.

It opens horizontally instead of vertically to fit more text on the page.

Which means it also fits more love inside my heart.

Because it is so cute.  And so awesome.  And my sister is the BEST.