The Atlantic had an article about the things lost when people give up their landline, and one of them is that we now go directly to the person we want to speak to by calling their line instead of making small talk with whoever picks up the phone.

It seems like such a small thing, but it’s true — needing to navigate parents and siblings to get to my friends gave me conversational practice that some kids could benefit from today. I say “some” because some kids pick up small talk even without the telephone situation, but others could have benefited from having to speak to random adults at a young age.

But even if it’s not small talk, kids will never get the excitement of having the family phone ring and wondering if it’s for them, or getting to talk to an older sibling on the way to a friend, or even waiting their turn for the line.

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

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We’ve labeled this frozen fruit summer. It started when Josh wanted chocolate-covered bananas. We bought a box from the freezer section but quickly moved to making them ourselves after we added up the cost of said box of frozen bananas. We ended each dinner for most of the summer with a chocolate-covered banana slice — perfection.

But then we expanded into frozen grapes due to an episode of The Handsome Podcast. Fortune Feimster mentioned frozen grapes, and I realized I had no clue how a frozen grape tasted. I don’t love regular grapes, but frozen grapes are one of the best things I’ve ever had.

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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.

Nathan Bransford recently asked how many books people read at once, and the comment section is fascinating.

I always go for two books at once — an e-book and a print book. I tend to favour the e-book option over the print one, sometimes because the e-book is a library book and it’s time-sensitive. But other times, it is because I shifted to e-books during the pandemic, and they somehow feel like the better reading experience now.

Sometimes, I end up reading three or more books at once, but then I feel stressed out. Even if I own all of the books (so time isn’t a factor), I find that having so many things started leaves me feeling like I have to read faster and get them finished. The only thing that doesn’t count is a re-read. I take my time with those, and I may have a few books open that I jump in and out of because I know the story well.

How many books do you read at once?

This is the 1000th (okay, 900th) time that I’ve written the Friday Blog Roundup, a weekly series that started back in 2006. It has always been a way to capture posts that stuck with me after I clicked away to read the next thing. Posts I wanted other people to read so we could talk about them. Posts I didn’t want to forget.

Can I just say that all of those posts have been my favourites?

Thank you for reading this series week after week, year after year. I am so grateful to everyone who commented, celebrated, and clicked over to read the posts over the last 18 years.

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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.

The Road Less Travelled marked her own milestone recently. It would have been Katie’s 26th birthday; her daughter was born still 26 weeks into pregnancy. She had a lovely day remembering her daughter, visiting the cemetery, and doing things with her husband to find comfort and mark the moment. Sending a lot of love for a hard day that ended with a butterfly messenger.

Lastly, Slaying, Blogging, Whatever received a beautiful email that made my throat close up from emotion. I’m not going to say anymore because it is brief and the impact is feeling all of the love behind the words. Yes, this post is outside the time frame, but I was late reading it.

The roundup to the Roundup: 1000th Friday Blog Roundups — celebrating a milestone. 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 August 9 – 16) 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.

As I say every month, I’m shamelessly stealing this idea from Jessica Lahey. She has a recurring monthly date where she reviews all the books she reads that month. Book reviews are important for authors, and I want to get better at doing this.

So. I’m going to review them here and also online, but I’m going to do it a little differently. I’m only going to review the stuff I really liked. I don’t see a reason to spend my time writing about something I didn’t love; it’s just using up more of my energy. So only positive reviews.

These are the books I liked (or mostly liked) from July.

One Perfect Couple (Ruth Ware): I had a hard time getting into this one. Then, it became intriguing. Then it became far-fetched. So. If you like Ruth Ware, you will probably like this book. It’s a good beach read, but it’s also one of the least realistic ones.

The Twist of a Knife (Anthony Horowitz): I have a thing where I won’t read the next book in this series until the next one comes out so I always have an Anthony Horowitz book to look forward to. I love his books that much. Like all of the other books in the series, this story was perfection. I love love love these books and would give them a million stars instead of just five if Goodreads allowed it.

The Bingo Hall Detectives (Jonathan Whitelaw): I was intrigued by this book because it had so many five-star reviews, so I bought it last time we were in the UK. It was a sweet cozy mystery with a bickering son-in-law and mother-in-law. It felt very Marlow Murders but in the Lake District. I’ll definitely read the next in the series, and I bought the third one when it was on sale.

Long Island Compromise (Taffy Brodesser-Akner): This was another book that exceeded the Goodreads star system. This was brilliant. Truly the best satire I’ve read in a long time that hits such a deep truth and familiar space. I loved every second of this book.

What did you read last month?