When David Jonathan Ross sent out Pomfret on July 1^st to his Font of the Month Club members, I immediately thought of using it for Simplexpression.

Pomfret is such a beautiful, elegant titling face based on Bertram Goodhue’s Arts & Crafts lettering for The Knight Errant magazine. Unlike the original drawing, David increased the contrast between thick and thin to give Pomfret the extra edge.

In addition, David added over 175 ligatures. Simplexpression has always been about the hidden letter E. As a result, Pomfret is perfect for the Simplexpression brand. With the new wordmark, MP, EX, and EX are joined together. Although SS is a ligature, I wanted to make it extra special. I flipped the second S to form the heart shape. It also gives a sense of weaving strings together like when my wife created her pieces with her hands. I really love how the new wordmark turned out. Take a look.

My experimentation with advertisement on this blog is so far so good. Even though I haven’t had any clients coming to me to book a spot, I have ads in the lineup in the next couple of weeks. These ads are the result of cold emails. It felt kind of awkward reaching out to potential advertisers who I have known asking to advertise on my site.

The first email I sent out, I felt immediate regret. Would the potential advertiser think I am being greedy? Would the potential advertiser think selling ads on my blog is silly? I kept checking my email to see if the advertiser had responded. To my surprise, the advertiser gave a positive response and was willing to schedule for two to three weeks. That reply gave me confidence to reach out to another one, and another one, and one more. So far, they have been supportive of my advertisement plan.

Why am I selling ads anyway? Obviously, it is not about the money because the price is quite low. I like ads when they are done well, especially high-quality ads in print magazines. The web has a bad rep for advertisement from the start and it is just getting worse. Advertisement on the web has been intrusive, annoying, and just creepy. Ads on the web interrupt the reading experience, slow down the website performance to a crawl, and invade users’ privacy. I don’t want any of that and I want to change all of that. I do not use any tracking. I have no Google Analytics. The only analytic I can see is through CloudFlare’s web traffic. I want to bring high-quality ads to the web. I am glad someone gets it. Sophia Lucero tweeted about this week’s ad:

as one who has a site with a sorta similar split layout / image sidebar, this is a refreshing & honest take on promoting

Before I decided to sell my own ads directly, I wanted to join Carbon Ads. Based on my monthly pageviews, I seemed to qualify. Unfortunately, I have not heard back from them about my application. It could be that my blog is not specific to design or development. I blog about anything under the sun. My experiment with sell ads directly is inspired by John Gruber’s Daring Fireball’s weekly sponsorships. He’s pulling $7,500 a week and he has consistently done week after week for many years. I am obviously not shooting for the moon here. If I can make a third of what he is making, I would quit my full-time job in a heartbeat. I don’t think I can make more than 50 bucks a week, but that’s good enough for me to cover the hosting and domain renewal expenses. That’s all I am aiming for.

Fifteen years ago, Kanye West went off script on national television and said, “George Bush doesn’t care about Black people.” He was mad the way Bush mishandled the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Unfortunately, he is helping an idiot who is mishandling the pandemic that affected Black people the hardest. What even more dangerous is that Kanye is being used to help re-elect a racist who doesn’t give a fuck about Black people. He has not done anything about police brutality against Black people. He sent in military to sweep up Black Lives Matter’s peaceful protests. He sides with the white supremacist over the black community. If Kanye truly cares about Black people, he should not let the GOP operatives using him. The Kanye campaign needs to end immediately. This is not a fucking game.

I have the pleasure of working with Kristin Bair to promote all three of her novels: Thirsty (September, 2009), The Art of Floating (April, 2014), and now Agatha Arch Is Afraid of Everything (November, 2020). With the release of her new book, she wanted a new website. Her goal is to have everything in one place. I revamped her website to draw attention to her new novel and to simplify her online presence.

Read my write-up or check out her new site.

Đọc vài bài tản văn đầu không ấn tướng lắm. Cảm thấy mình quá già với những tâm trạng của tác giả trẻ. Tôi để sang một bên đọc sách khác. Thấy sách này cũng khá ngắn nên tôi trở lại lần thứ nhì. Những bài tản văn ngắn như những blog posts được viết với tâm trạng cô đơn và trống vắng. Tuy buồn nhưng không bi đát. Phần truyện ngắn với những câu chuyện tình ở tuổi 20 thì cảm xúc hơn. Gari viết nhẹ nhàng như hơi thở và thơ mộng như những giấc mơ. Tuy không phải là khán giả của Gari, tôi đọc để tìm hiểu cảm xúc giới trẻ bây giờ ra sao.

Joe Biden makes the wise decision by selecting Senator Kamala Harris to be his running mate. Ms. Harris is smart, tough, and fearless. In primary debates, she proved that she can take on anyone including Biden. She attacked him again and again. It goes to show that Biden has a big heart. By picking Ms. Harris, Biden proved that he can work with anyone, including people who were critical of him and his past policies. Beating Pence at the debate will be a piece of cake for Ms. Harris. Maybe he should bring his wife along to help him out. I can’t wait to see Ms. Harris take on the orange idiot. I am excited about team Biden and Harris. Let’s win this!

On Sunday, we took the kids to the closest beach from our home. The drive was almost two hours. As we drove closer to our destination, I suggested that we grab some lunch. I also suggested sushi because Đạo and Đán loved sushi, but my wife immediately shot that down. She suggested we grab something quick from McDonald’s. So we did.

We spent three hours playing in the water. The kids had lots of fun. On our way back, my wife suggested that we grab dinner so she wouldn’t have to cook. Great idea. Đán suggested sushi, but my mother-in-law wouldn’t eat raw fish. Xuân and Vương wouldn’t like sushi either. I suggested we get them Vietnamese food or something else at a different restaurant for them. We can ended up going straight home.

While the kids took a bath, I put away all the things from our minivan and my wife threw some egg rolls in the frying pan. We had vermicelli with egg rolls and vegetables. She also made some tofu kimchi soup. Dinner was simple and delicious. I drank some of my cold lychee saké.

When it was time for me to do the dishes, I thanked her for dinner. Then she said something along the line that she always had to cook for all of us. I reminded her that we could have ordered out. I should have stopped there, but I went on. I told her that when I took the kids out, I tried my best not to take them to fast-food places. She flipped out and accused me of being an elitist. She said that only I knew how to feed them good food and she only fed them McDonald’s.

No, that was not what I meant, but I know I needed to shut up. That was not my intention at all. I meant to say that I wouldn’t settle for fast food for the sake of convenience. When we went out together before the pandemic, the most relaxed time for me was sitting at the restaurant, getting a drink, and chatting with the kids, especially with Đạo and Đán, while waiting for the food.

I was not trying to be an ass, but I guess we’re at the point in our relationship where whatever we say would irritate the fuck out of each other. I need to keep my bullshit to myself.

Today, we’re back to normal again. I am learning how to wrap up a fight.

Anne Applebaum writes in the Atlantic:

Even if the Democratic nominee wins, “Can Biden reach into the opposite bubble?” is a question not just for the autumn of 2020 but for the spring of 2021, the winter of 2022, and many years into the future. The need to reach across informational and cultural divides will add an extra layer of complication to the multiple economic, medical, and foreign-policy crises a new Biden administration would immediately face, and will make it difficult to carry out the deep reforms that our bureaucracy, our democracy, and our health-care system need. But unless Biden makes an effort to talk with his opponents, he could end up much like the candidate in the Polish wheat field, with only the facts and 49 percent of the public on his side. Biden’s campaign may represent the last chance to bridge the gaps that divide us. If Trump wins another term, then we can be certain that no one will even try.

President Gregory Washington responds to George Mason’s legacy:

Should we then now continue to recognize George Mason and other founders as brilliant and devoted patriots? Or should we condemn them for ignoring the basic ideals by which they defined this country?

We should do both, because Mason is the very embodiment of the duality of America, which we celebrate for its insistence on liberty and justice for all, even though it enslaved and segregated millions of its own people for most of its history.

We’ll see how this will play out.

Quyển tùy bút viết về kí ức tuổi thơ của tác giả. Những câu chuyện dễ thương như tình cảm của “Gà mẹ, gà mẹ,” kỉ niệm khó quên “Ngày đầu tiên đi học,” trò chơi “Tát ao” bắt cá, hoặc sự ngây thơ ở tuổi mới biết yêu. Trần Nùng viết giản dị và nhẹ nhàng khơi lại trong tôi những ngày tháng còn ở quê nhà. Ngày xưa tôi cũng thích đi tát ao bắt cá ở nhà nội và tự chơi những trò chơi không cần đến tiền mua. Tuổi trẻ giờ đây không giống như ngày xưa nữa. Chỉ thích ôm iPad và điện thoại thông minh trong phòng có máy lạnh chứ không tự tìm những sinh hoạt ngoài trời như ngày xưa. Một thời đã qua.