After some contemplation, I have decided to continue my ice skating lessons. The main reason is that I was able to recruit Xuân to join us as well. It is convenient that all four of us will have lessons on the same day. Đạo and Xuân will start at 6:50 pm. Đán and I will start at 7:40 pm.

Xuân will begin the Tot ¾ level. He will learn to push and glide strokes, prepare for snow plow stop, dip, skate forward and backward swizzle, push right and left T-position, stop with one-foot or two-foot snow plow, and skate backward wiggle. He will have fun at this level.

I will begin the Gamma​ level with the same instructor. I will learn to do the three-turn right and left forward outsides, the Mohawk combination right-foot and left-foot insides, and the hockey stop. I know how to do a bit of the hockey stop, but I have no idea about the three-turns and the Mohawks. I am looking forward to the lessons.

Between the group lessons for four us and countless public sessions for us to play and practice, we are making quite a bit of an investment into the Fairfax Ice Arena. I am now taking on freelance web design and development projects to cover it. I am wrapping up a fun, useful site for the Mural Arts Philadelphia. If you need a small website for your business or passion, hit me up.

In Đán’s interim progress report for the third quarter, his teachers write: “Thank you for your support with Dan. He has shown great improvement with his class participation and completing his assignments on time.”

In the past few weeks, I worked with him closely. At first, I was so frustrated because he seemed clueless. He didn’t know what went on during class. Tuesday last week for instance, I had to take care of an issue at work that required me to be focused. I asked him to pay attention to his teacher. When I saw him idling, I asked him what he was supposed to do and he didn’t have a clue. I yelled at him then I felt awful afterward. I needed to be more patience.

The next day I kept reminding him to sit up and to pay attention. I also made him raise his hand to participate in class discussion. He didn’t want to speak up because he was afraid to give the wrong answer. He wanted to check with me first before he would raise his hand. He felt more confidence when he had the right answer. He is now participating a bit more and his teachers have recognized his efforts.

He wrote another poem yesterday in language art. He even shared with his classmates. He read out loud:

I love to make sushi
For me and my family
We enjoy eating them together
The memory will last forever

His teacher danced in her chair. She was so happy with the progress he is making. Today, she taught them alliterations. For class assignment, he needed to come up with a phrase that had alliteration based on his name. He wrote, “Dan digs Dunkin’ Donuts.” His teacher had a good laugh at that one.

From what I had observed, he was not clueless. He was just bored and was not paying attention. To get him engaged, I advised him to make his assignments about the things he enjoyed. Since he is passionate about cooking, he incorporated food into his assignments.

Staying focused is definitely a challenge for him. He didn’t do well on his tests or assessments because he tried to answer without reading the questions. I often had to remind him to slow down and read the question carefully before selecting an answer.

I am glad that he has shown some improvements, but he will need help with his ADHD. I am here for him now, but I can’t do this in the long term. Once he goes back to the classroom environment or I go back to work in my office, I won’t be able to be with him. Now that we know the issues he is facing, we can get him the help he needs.

Vài năm trước Mẹ thường hay xem mấy cái video Võ Hoàng Yên chữa những người bị tật nguyền. Mẹ khen ông ta là thần y nên tôi cũng xem thử. Tôi không phải là bác sĩ và không trong ngành y, nhưng khi nhìn thấy cách chữa trị của ông ta là biết ngay là đóng kịch và lừa đảo.

Bệnh nhân bị liệt chân bẩm sinh mà ông chỉ cần bấm nguyệt kéo ra kéo vô là đi được ngay. Có người bị điếc ông chỉ cần bấm và đập vào lỗ tai vài lần là nghe được. Còn người câm cũng nói được sau khi được ông bỏ tờ giấy tissue vào miệng và bấm vài cái. Nhìn vào là biết là dối trá rồi mà mẹ còn muốn tìm đến ông ta để chữa trị cho ba. Tôi giải thích cho mẹ và khuyên mẹ đừng nên dễ dàng tin những gì xem trên Youtube hoặc trên mạng xã hội.

Sau này không thấy mẹ xem video của ông ta nữa và cũng đã lâu rồi không thấy những video của ông ta được chia sẻ trên Facebook nữa nên tôi nghĩ chắc ông ta đã bị vạch mặt rồi. Không ngờ hôm nay thấy thiên hạ lại chia sẻ ông bà nào đó bị lừa gạt tiền cả tỷ nên đã lên án tố cáo ông ta.

Ông Võ Hoàng Yên là một trong những ví dụ nghiêm trọng về tin giả (disinformation) và thuyết âm mưu (conspiracy theory) trong cộng đồng Việt trong và ngoài nước. Từ lúc ông Trump làm tổng thống, những tin tức bậy bạ càng lan truyền nhanh chóng và mạnh mẽ trong cộng đồng người Việt. Tuy giờ đây ông không còn tiếng nói trong chính trị nữa nhưng cái ngu của ông ta vẫn còn tồn tại trong rất nhiều tâm hồn những người vẫn cuồng ông. Có người cho rằng cái ngu không thể nào sửa chữa được và tôi đồng ý nên đã hoàn toàn rút lui ra khỏi thế giới chính trị. Tôi đã không viết blog và không còn hứng thú về những đề tài này nữa. Ông ta đã bị bại nặng nề đó là sự thật không thể chối cãi không cần phải bàn tán. Ai tin hay không tin là sự tự do cá nhân của họ nó không liên quan đến sự thật. Như chuyện chữa bệnh của ông Võ Hoàng Yên, nhìn như thế mà vẫn bị lừa đảo quá dễ dàng.

This evening I wrapped up my seven-week ice skating lessons. Beta was a challenging level for me because it focused on backward skating. I struggled to keep up. Every week I took half an hour of lesson time, but I spent at least five hours practicing in public sessions. I was a bit stressed out because we had to take a test at the end of each level. We had to pass the test in order to move to the next level.

Before taking the test tonight, I took a practice session to make sure I would pass. The test went well. I scored 49/50. I got perfect points for stroking, left T-stop, right T-stop, and left-over-right crossover. I got a 9 for my right-over-left crossover because when I crossed my right foot over, I also slid my left foot to the opposite side. It was a natural instinct.

Overall, the hard work paid off, but I am still debating whether I should take the next level, which is Gamma. I want to learn ice skating just for fun and having to take the test puts more pressure on the whole learning experience. Maybe I am just taking it more seriously than I should.

My coach always wore a beanie all the way to her eyebrows and a huge black mask that covered her entire face. Revealing only her eyes made her both mysterious and a bit intimidating. She appeared to be tougher than she was. She was an excellent teacher and I learned quite a bit from her coaching.

I am an old-ass father who loves to skate with his kids. Whether on ice or on the street, I always wear my helmet and my protective gears. Although I don’t do anything crazy, I don’t want to put myself at risk even for minor injuries.

Đán wears his helmet, but he refuses to wear his protective gears when we go ice skating. He banged his knee against the wall real hard. He was in pain for a week. If he had his knee pads on, he could have protected his knees.

One time, we witnessed a woman break her wrist and an ambulance was called to take her to the hospital. She wore a helmet, but if she had her wrist guards on, she might have prevented the injury.

I had seen several adults fall and hit their head on ice, and yet not too many people wore helmets. At the skateparks, I rarely saw any skateboarders wearing helmets. From what I have read, wearing a helmet makes a skateboarder appear weak. I am at the age where that type of pressure doesn’t get to me. I explained to my kids that I rather look weak than the possibility of getting a head injury.

In retrospect, I put my life in danger on several occasions when I was a teenager myself. I hadn’t seen a coffin; therefore, I hadn’t shed a tear.

In high school, I rode with my best friend at the time who was into car racing. Once in a while, I sat next to him in his little red Acura Integra as he was doing 100 to 120 miles per hour on the highway racing against other friends with cars. Neither of us had our seatbelt on. What the fuck was I thinking? My life was in his hands.

A gun incident at a friend’s house still gives me a chill every time I think about it. The friend’s stepfather was a gun enthusiast. He had guns around his house. Another friend picked up a shotgun on the sofa and aimed at my head. They both knew the gun was not loaded. I suspect the gun was not loaded, but I told him it didn’t matter. I looked in his eyes and said that I didn’t want him to pull the trigger. He did anyway. I felt the chill air passing by my head. He thought it was just a joke, but I was dead serious. I didn’t need a friend who put my life in danger so fuck him. I never went back to the friend’s house again.

A boating accident still leaves me devastated even though it happened decades ago. A handful of us rented two canoes at a state park. None of us wore life jackets. Being dumb teenagers, we stood up on the canoe, which caused it to capsize. I could barely swim. Luckily, I was able to grab onto the boat. We flipped it over and climbed back on. We thought everyone was safe until we realized one of us was missing. He was a good friend of mine. We couldn’t find him. He was gone. If we had our life jackets on, he would still be here today.

In the time of the global pandemic, wearing masks could stop the spread of the virus. If wearing a mask could protect each other and save lives, it is not about freedom, but about responsibility. It is an individual freedom to not wear a mask, but it is not a freedom if the individual could affect others. If we had done our part, the death toll could have been less than 500,000 and my mother could have been alive today.

Maybe I am getting old; therefore, I am getting much more cautious. I take precautions over preventable risks any time. I have the responsibilities not just for my family, but also for my community and for my country.

I was elated to see one of my posts was quoted in one of my favorite websites. I have been following Robin Rendle’s blog and newsletter for a while. I admire his writing, both style and subjects. We shared some common interests including typography and web design. I am glad that he found “Inheritance” resonated with him and that we both have thought about the life of our blogs. He expands on it:

At some point or another this website, this URL, won’t resolve though. Maybe the Internet Archive will stick around for a while, but then everything is locked within this vast archive.

But if my URL is dead, my website dies with it.

My work shouldn’t be presented in the Smithsonian behind glass or anything, I’m just pointing at this enormous flaw in the architecture of the web itself: you’re renting servers and renting URLs. Nothing is permanent because on the web we don’t really own any space, we’re just borrowing land temporarily.

I dashed off that post when my son said, “When you die, I will read your Visualgui.” I have thought about this topic when Kevin Davis, a former colleague at Vassar College, passed away in 2010. Kevin was a fantastic designer and developer. His website (alazanto.org) was beautiful and distinctively personal. It was created in Flash, but he fed in his poems through XML. After he died, I still visited his site and read the poems he had written. Then one day, the site stopped working because Flash was no longer supported and was uninstalled on my browsers. I guess he didn’t have a chance to update his site to HTML and CSS. Then one day it was completely gone. I guess his payment had ran out and he didn’t leave his keys to anyone else.

Quyển tiểu thuyết với những câu chuyện bi đát được kể phi thứ tự, phi thời gian, và phi không gian. Cái thú vị khi đọc sách là không cần chú ý đến nội dung. Khi thì ở thế giới song song khi thì ở thế giới vật chất, tác giả đưa đi đâu thì tưởng tượng đến đó. Mỗi chương là mỗi câu chuyện khác nhau nhưng lại có liên quan và kết nối với nhau. Phần lớn đề tài là về sự đau khổ và khủng khiếp của chiến tranh, mất mát và tranh giành trong xã hội, và gian trá và chiếm đoạt trong tình yêu và tình người. Cây bút của Nguyễn Một quá sắc bén. Nhà văn tạo ra những nhân vật khá ấn tượng rồi chém không nương tay. Từ những cảnh đổ máu thê thảm đến những cảnh sex mặn nồng, nhà văn viết hay và cũng rất táo bạo. Như đoạn văn này đã in sâu vào đầu của tôi sau khi đọc:

Nông thôn luôn là chiến trường cho các cuộc chiến tranh, những người dân hiến lành cam chịu, hứng trọn những đau thương do chiến tranh mang lại. Ngày xưa cũng thế, bây giờ cũng thế và chắc là sau này cũng thế. Không chỉ hứng chịu sự chết chóc mà họ còn gánh vác cả việc nuôi quân. Họ khổ ngay từ khi lọt lòng mẹ. Những đứa trẻ ở thành phố lớn lên trong nhung lụa với đủ loại sữa. Những đứa trẻ nông thôn uống nước cơm và ngủ trên những manh chiếu rách, nhấy nhụa ruôi nhặng. Lan đã lớn lên như thế, từ ngày mẹ cô chết đi, cha mang cô đi bú nhờ hàng xóm. Những hôm đi làm ruộng ông treo chiếc võng dưới gốc cây duối để cho cô nằm. Những tia nắng len qua tàn duối rọi gương mặt bé bỏng của cô. Khi cô khóc, ông nâng cô trên đôi bàn tay thô ráp vụng về và hờ hờ thay cho lời ru, những tiếng hờ phát ra cùng với hơi thở nặng nhọc, như tiếng gừ của con chó cái đang cho con bú. Ông nhét những muỗng nước cơm nhạt thếch vào miệng cô. Những tiếng hờ của ông làm cho cô nhớ đến những giọt sữa của con chó cái. Con chó đã cho cô bú cùng với hai đứa con của nó. Khi ông ra vườn ông đặt cô nằm trên manh chiếu rách, cô đã bò lại bên bầu vú của con chó, bằng phản xạ tự nhiên cô ngoạm vào bầu vú căng tròn của nó. Con chó thoáng giật mình rồi nằm xuống, nhẹ nhàng vuốt ve cô bằng cái lưỡi đỏ và thổ ráp. Bú no, cô ngủ ngon lành trong lòng con chó đến khi cha cô vào và ẵm lên. Giữa cô và con chó đã hình thành tình mẫu tử thiêng liêng. Một sợi dây vô hình ràng buộc khiến cô yêu thương nó vô hạn. Cha cô cũng yêu quý và biết ơn con chó, nên cho phép nó ngồi ăn cùng mâm như một thành viên của gia đình. Ông nhặt được nó hom hem bên vệ đường ngày cô vừa chào đời. Nó đã được mẹ cô nặn sữa để nuôi, bà âu yếm gọi con chó là bé, nó lớn lên bằng dòng sữa của mẹ cô và sau này, khi đã trở thành chú chó to lớn, nó đã trả ơn mẹ cô!

What will I leave my children when I die? Since I don’t have anything worthy or much money, I haven’t thought about it yet. Yesterday, Đán told me, “When you die, I will read your Visualgui.” I smiled at him and asked, “Will you and Đạo take care of it when I die?” He replied, “Sure, we will take care of it for you.”

I often wondered what will happen to my websites when I die. Will they just die with me? I have invested a tremendous amount of time and effort into them. This blog, in particular, has documented 18 years of my life. It has become my daily journal and I haven’t intended to stop writing. I will continue to maintain and redesign it for as long as I can.

Even though I make a living as a professional web designer, I find my passion and motivation to stay in the game from my personal websites. The web has not only allowed me to feed my family, it also allowed me to express myself. I can share anything to the world from just a few clicks away. When I wrote Vietnamese Typography, as my final thesis for my MA in graphic design, I knew that the only way to reach as many type designers and typographers all over the world was to publish it as a website. I also wanted to make it freely available for anyone to read. I did not expect it to become my little consulting business on the side.

I love the web and I love making websites that are meant to stay around for a long time. The tribute website I created for Ngọc Lan has been around for 18 years. Even though it is no longer as active as it was in the early days, I still am maintaining it for as long as I can.

A few years before Mr. Đình Cường passed away, his health was declining. His son hired me to put together a website as a special gift for him. Now the site has become an archive of his artworks. His legacy will live on as long as his son maintains the website. Thơ mưa, a book of poetry by Cao Nguyên, is another website that will stay on for as long as the author wants to keep it.

As for my own blog, I am not sure how long I will continue to keep it, but I am happy that Đán is willing to take care of it after I die. My sites might have no value to anyone else, but they are my pride and legacy. I designed them with pure HTML and CSS so that they will stay around for a long time. Fancy frameworks come and go, HTML and CSS stay around. I also host my webfonts along with my websites, instead of using a third party, to make sure that they will continue to work in the future.

Yesterday, Đạo mentioned that he had gone through 400 pages of my blog and read posts that were specifically about our family. He is now in 2009 and only has six more years of materials to read through. Only my own son has that much dedication to my writing and that means the whole world to me.

Nguyễn Một:

Đời người có năm cái hồi. Hồi thứ nhất là hồi nhỏ, rồi lớn biết yêu là hồi hộp, lúc trung niên là hồi đó, già như [bây giờ] là hồi xưa và cuối cùng là hồi trống [đưa mình ra nghĩa địa].

Tuần rồi đi kiểm tra thường niên. Kết quả cũng tạm tạm. Chỉ cần bỏ bia, bỏ rượu, bỏ thịt bò, bỏ chao, bỏ đồ chiên, bỏ đồ ngọt thì sức khỏe sẽ tốt.

Từ ngày mẹ mất, tôi đã bỏ hết tất cả, trừ đồ ngọt. Ăn chay 55 ngày giảm được 4 pounds. Thứ bảy vừa rồi thằng Đán năn nỉ tôi ăn thịt để nó trổ tài chiên cánh gà cho tôi thử. Thôi thì nó có lòng thì thử. Cánh gà mới chiên giòn rụm ăn thật ngon. Thế là bắt đầu ăn mặn trở lại. Hôm qua cân thử lên lại 3 pounds chỉ sau bốn ngày ăn thịt.

Bác sĩ dặn phải giảm cân để không bệnh ngủ, không bị mỡ trong gan, và không bị nhiều chứng bệnh khác. Tôi hỏi bác sĩ về việc rối loạn giấc ngủ có cần đi sleep study không? Bác sĩ hỏi tại sao tôi nghĩ tôi bị sleep apnea (ngừng thở khi ngủ). Tôi ngáy rất to và có cảm giác ngủ không được sâu. Dường như chưa ngủ mà thức giấc thì sáu giờ sáng. Thế là không muốn ngủ lại. Bác sĩ hỏi tôi có triệu chứng ngủ rũ hay không. Chiều chiều nằm sofa đọc sách thì hay bị buồn ngủ. Bình thường thì không.

Bác sĩ cho biết nếu ngủ được 7 tiếng một đêm thì không phải rối loạn giấc ngủ. Nếu không bị buồn ngủ lúc lái xe hoặc sáng thức dậy vẫn không cảm thấy buồn ngủ thì không cần đi khám nghiệm. Chỉ cần giảm cân là mọi việc sẽ ổn.

Đó là lời bác sĩ ở ngoài còn bác sĩ ở nhà thì bảo tôi phải đi sleep study. Tiếng ngáy của tôi làm mọi người khó ngủ. Tôi đụng đâu ngủ đó mà không gọi là triệu chứng ngủ rũ. Thôi thì lấy hẹn đi thí nghiệm cho chắc ăn.