Một bài nhạc mới mang âm hưởng Huế của nhạc sĩ Võ Tá Hân phổ thơ của Cao Nguyên. Nhạc phẩm được Diệu Hiền trình bài đẹp và thơ mộng. Mời nghe.

Our Fios Internet has been slowed and dropped constantly the past few months. I was hoping the router would fix itself so I don’t have to call Verizon’s customer service, but the problem has not been fixed and my wife kept pressing me to call so I did yesterday. I dialed 1-800-837-4966 and managed to get a representative after selecting some options. After taking down my account information and the issue, she transferred me to tech support. Again, after taking down my information and issue, anther representative transferred to Fios department. Again, after taking down my information and issue, anther representative transferred to Fios tech support. Then the Fios tech support transferred me back to the the same original options I first got when I dialed the 1-800 number. Wasting 45 minutes, I was led to nowhere and all I simply wanted was a new router.

• “Prince, Cecil Taylor, and Beyoncé’s Shape-Shifting Black Body” by Hilton Als
• “Cruel Optimism: The daunting ambition of Anohni” by Hua Hsu
• “Beyoncé’s “Lemonade” Is a Revelation of Spirit” by Carrie Battan
• “Weeding the Worst Library Books” by Daniel A. Gross
• “Madness: In Florida prisons, mentally ill inmates have been tortured, driven to suicide, and killed by guards” by Eyal Press

The gout seems to subside today. I popped 4 pills of Tylenol yesterday, ate some steamed mung bean, and drank lots of water. Today a reader sent me a remedy for gout by mixing Apple Cider Vinegar with Tart Cherry Juice. He said it worked for him so I’ll definitely give it a try tonight even though it sounds pretty sour. I might mix it with some whiskey to help with the flavor. Just kidding.

Speaking of liquor, I still have unopened bottles of Hennessy Cognac XO, Patrón Silver Tequila, and Corralejo Blanco. What am I going to do with them?

• “Sorry, You Can’t Speed Read” by Gray Matter
• “In Campaign and Company, Ivanka Trump Has a Central Role” by Jonathan Mahler
• “Taylor Swift As You’ve Never Seen Her Before” by Jason Gay
• “Godmother of Soul” by Kelefa Sanneh
• “The Fight for the Future of NPR” by Leon Neyfakh
• “Secret Rules of the Internet” by Catherine Buni and Soraya Chemaly

The foot doctor was right. I definitely have gout. The attack started a couple of days ago and it got worse yesterday and today. I took two Tylenols this morning and it seems to help with the pain. I hope it will go away in the next couple of days because I am not going back for another Triamcinolone Acetonide injection. The shot was fucking excruciating.

On the negative side, I have to give up steak, seafood, alcohol and many pleasurable dietaries in life. I am now forced to be responsible what I will be consuming. On the bright side, I have no choice but to eat healthy and quit drinking. Life will be healthier but suck. There’s always a tradeoff.

Mời nghe những bài thơ của anh Cao Nguyên:

• “Thu” (Thu Thủy)
• “Một giấc mơ” (Đài Trang)
• “Mưa đêm” (Thu Thủy)
• “Mưa 2” (Đài Trang)
• “Tuyết rơi” (Thu Thủy)
• “Mưa” (Đài Trang)

This review from The New Yorker seems to get the word mixed up. Daniel Wenger writes:

It was Vuong’s mother, a manicurist, who gave him his name. (He was born Vinh Quoc Vuong.) On a summer day at the nail salon, she told a customer that she wanted to go to the beach. She kept saying, “I want to go to the bitch,” Vuong told me. The customer suggested that she use the word “ocean” instead. Upon learning that the ocean is not a beach but a body of water that touches many countries—including Vietnam and the United States—she renamed her son.

The poet name is Vương, which means king. Dương, on the other hand, is ocean.

I can’t wait to take the workshop on “Type Design for Non-Type Designers” with Matteo Bologna. My goal is to understand enough technical requirements so I can experimenting with creating diacritical marks for open-source typefaces that don’t have support for the Vietnamese language. I am hopeful that the workshop can help me with my goal.

A gift of $30 million dollars comes with more pundits. The acronyms were unfortunate even though they were unintended.

Yes, the jokes were on us and they had spread like wildfire on social media. The school has rearranged the words around a bit to avoid the awkward acronyms, but social media still hasn’t let it go. The tasteless jokes have detracted the attention away from the real issue, which is the Justice himself and what he stood for.

Love it or hate it, the humor has grabbed tons of attention from the media and they all reporting on the jokes rather than the issues. I don’t know if I should be proud or embarrassed to see my design featuring on so many media websites. Here are just a few:

• Washington Post
• Mother Jones
• The Wall Street Journal
• Slate
• Yahoo
• WJLA

When I first informed about the name change, which was only a few days before the official announcement, I was shocked, but I had to do my job. I was tasked to tweak the logo, create the new banners, and prepared the changes on the site. The jokes on the acronyms are so prominent that they have no room for the design. I am glad.