I snowboarded at Whitetail for a bit today. I did about 6 runs on Bold Decision to practice short turns on the double black slope. Thanks to the soft snow coverage, I did not slide down on my ass like I did at Liberty. I still couldn’t complete my short turns. I could do a heel or a toe turn then slid down. I couldn’t find a comfortable spot to make the next turn. I need to learn how to snowboard down the double-black slopes with ease.

We went to Liberty today for the first time this season. As far as snowmaking, Liberty hadn’t done as well as Whitetail. While Whitetail has all of its trails open, Liberty still only has a few. Nevertheless, the lift lines on the frontside were long.

While Vương and my wife skied, Xuân and I snowboarded. We started out at the learning center. We waited for 10 to 15 minutes to get on the lift and it only took us a minute to skied down. Vương got bored and wanted to take the long green trail. We took the express lift up. Luckily, the line was not too long. The long green trail was narrow and there were tons of people–many of them falling constantly. I was worried someone would crash into Vương, but he just skied his way down. My wife did a great job too. Xuân struggled on the snowboard for a bit on the flat surface. After the long trail, the kids wanted to have lunch.

They went in with my wife and I went back to the backside for the blues and the double-black slopes. I was doing fine on the blues, but struggled on the black. The double-black was so ice that I slipped on my butt all the way down when I turned on my heel edge. I needed to lean forward a bit instead of backward.

We had a nice time together as a family. I am glad to see Xuân taking up snowboarding and Vương and my wife can do the green slopes.

It was a snow day. The kids had no school and I had no work. Of course we went skiing. We arrived at Whitetail around 2 pm. Đạo and Đán went on their own to the back side. Xuân, Vương, my wife, and I went to the learning center.

Xuân wanted to try snowboarding again and to my surprise he picked it really well. He only fell a few times. Vương was doing great skiing as well. We stayed at the learning center for a few hours and then went on Sidewinder (the long blue trail). The kids enjoyed it. My wife fell a few times, but she made it through.

I wanted to go to the back side as well, but it was already 7:00 pm. We wrapped up all day. Even though I didn’t get a chance to ski or snowboard on the blue and black trails. I was happy to see Xuân made progress on the snowboard and Vương made a huge leap forward on skis.

I’ll come back tomorrow to do my own things.

My friend informed me about the insane deal from A Book Apart: buy 20 paperbacks for $100. Yesterday, I created a collection just for A Book Apart. My order is out for delivery. I will spend the next few months or the entire year reading books from A Book Apart.

1. Better Onboarding, by Krystal Higgins, explains, illustrates and walks us through designing a successful onboarding experience.
2. Cross-Cultural Design, by Senongo Akpem, provides principles of design that embrace cultural diversity.
3. Design for Safety, by Eva PenzeyMoog, demonstrates that it is our responsibilities as designers and developers to create digital products that put our users’ safety first.
4. Flexible Typesetting, by Tim Brown, is an essential guide to shape better typography on the web.
5. Going Offline, by Jeremy Keith, explains the ins and outs of service works in clear, comprehensible details.
6. HTML5 for Web Designers, by Jeremy Keith, is the quickest way to learn the new HTML elements.
7. Inclusive Design Communities, by Sameera Kapila, sheds the light on the dark corner of marginalized identities.
8. The New CSS Layout, by Rachel Andrew, shows you how to create powerful, flexible layouts with just a few lines of CSS.
9. On Web Typography, by Jason Santa Maria, proves that the process of working with types on the web could be rewarding, engaging, and not daunting.
10. Practical Design Discovery, by Dan Brown, examines discovery as a mindset, not a process. Discovery is about the right attitude, not a set of instructions.
11. Responsible JavaScript, by Jeremy Wagner, is a must read for web developers who care about progressive enhancement and inclusivity.
12. Responsible Responsive Design, by Scott Jehl, a companion to Ethan Marcotte’s Responsive Web Design, is a required read for front-end developers who want to make the web more accessible and faster.
13. Responsive Web Design, by Ethan Marcotte, is a must-read responsive web design book written by the man who discovered and popularized the concept.
14. SEO for Everyone, by Rebekah Baggs and Chris Corak, make the case for human-centered optimization rather then search engine algorithms.
15. Sustainable Web Design, by Tom Greenwood, demonstrates that creating sustainable websites isn’t hard or impossible.
16. You Should Write a Book, by Katel LeDû and Lisa Maria Marquis, guide you through the entire publishing process with clarity, authority, years of experience, and doses of humor.

Những ngày cuối năm của 2023, anh bạn từ Canada sang Virginia thăm gia đình. Lần nào anh qua cũng đều gọi tôi ra chơi. Từ quán nhậu đến nhà họ hàng của anh, chỗ nào có rượu, nhạc, và thức ăn là có niềm vui. Tuy mỗi năm chỉ gặp nhau một hoặc hai lần nhưng chúng tôi trở nên thân thiết vì hợp gu với nhau. Từ ngày quen biết anh qua trang blog của tôi đến nay đã mười mấy năm rồi. Nhờ viết blog mà tôi quen biết được một người bạn đời và một người bạn đường.

Trở lại với đêm đón giao thừa năm vừa qua. Khuya hôm đó mấy anh em ngồi nhậu và hát karaoke ở nhà họ hàng của anh. Tôi chỉ ngồi nghe, thưởng thức món ruột heo chiên giòn với dưa cải chua, và nhâm nhi ly Yamazaki trên tay. Đến hai ba giờ sáng, anh rủ tôi ca một bài cho vui. Lúc đó rượu thấm vào nên tôi mới nổi máu văn nghệ và định ca bài “Kỷ niệm” của nhạc sĩ Phạm Duy. Thay vì hát karaoke, anh đề nghị để anh đệm keyboard cho tôi hát. Trước giờ tôi chưa từng hát acoustic nhưng lúc đó xỉn rồi còn ngại ngùng gì nữa.

Không ngờ lúc anh đánh keyboard, tôi chỉ việc thong thả hát. Tôi hát sao anh đệm theo đó, rất nhẹ nhàng êm ái và không ồn ào như hát karaoke. Tôi thích ngay cách chơi acoustic vừa ấm cúng vừa thân mật. Tôi yêu cầu anh đánh thêm cho tôi hát những bài nhạc Trịnh mà tôi thích. Dường như giữ tôi và anh cũng hợp ý nhau trong âm nhạc.

Đêm nay ngoài trời đầy tuyết và nhiệt độ băng giá nhưng lại không đi ski được nên tôi muốn hát vu vơ cho ấm lòng và cho đỡ cơn nghiện không thể lên tuyết núi. Không có anh bạn đánh keyboard thì đành dùng karacoustic vậy. Ngẫu hứng hát lại ca khúc nhạc Trịnh có câu mà anh bạn đã từng chia sẻ với tôi: “Cuộc đời đó có bao lâu mà hững hờ”.

I might have Metatarsalgia. It might have started when I played soccer for two hours and then went skiing and snowboarding on Saturday. I started to feel a sharp pain at the bottom of my left foot on Sunday when the whole family went skiing and snowboarding.

On Monday, I felt the pain when I pressed my foot against the footrest in my car. Fortunately, the pain didn’t interfere with neither skiing or snowboarding. Nevertheless, I needed to take a break to rest my foot.

I didn’t want to take any medication and I was limping around the house. My wife insisted that I should take some medication. I took an Aleve last night before going to bed and felt much better this morning. I’ll take one or two more pills in the next few days to get rid of the pain.

Somehow Aleve works like magic for me, but I am still being really careful with it. I only take it when I absolutely need to. I don’t want to abuse it.

This handy PHP script will print out all the specified files (.jpg and .png):

<?php
// open this directory
$myDirectory = opendir(".");

// get each entry
while($entryName = readdir($myDirectory)) {
$dirArray[] = $entryName;
}

// close directory
closedir($myDirectory);

// count elements in array
$indexCount = count($dirArray);

// sort 'em
sort($dirArray);

// print 'em

// loop through the array of files and print them all
for($index=0; $index < $indexCount; $index++) {
if ((substr("$dirArray[$index]", -4, 4) == ".jpg") || (substr("$dirArray[$index]", -4, 4) == ".png")){ // only list jpg and png files
print('<img src="'.$dirArray[$index].'">');
}
}

?>

My wife and kids didn’t want to join me today; therefore, I went solo. Even though Whitetail was crowded, I didn’t have to wait long in the single line. The back lift also opened; therefore, I stayed at the back side until I needed to come back to the base.

I started out snowboarding for five runs. Came back to the base and ate some smoked salmons. I switched to ski and did three more runs. I spent about three hours and went back home. It was a great day.

Mad props to the snowmaking team at Whitetail. They have been making snow any chance they get. As long as the weather stays low, the next few weeks will be nice.

Chín tình khúc nổi tiếng một thời của nhạc sĩ Bảo Chấn được nhạc sĩ Đức Trí hòa âm lại theo phong cách thính phòng nhẹ nhàng. Ngoài những giọng hát quen thuộc như Mỹ Hạnh, Lê Hiếu, Uyên Linh, Lân Nhã còn có những giọng hát chưa quen (với tôi) đã đóng góp trong album.

Hakoota Dũng Hà có chất giọng trầm ấm và anh trình bài “Biển chờ” qua giai điệu blues-jazz thật nồng nàn. Qua giọng hát mềm mại truyền cảm, Bích Trâm thể hiện ca khúc “Mùa thu” với phần đệm acoustic mộc mạc thật êm ái và cảm xúc. Cece Trương chuyên chở giai điệu funk-jazz trong “Chiếc lá vô tình” thật dễ thương.

Một lần nữa, Đức Trí đã thực hiện một sản phẩm giá trị về phần hòa âm phối khí phù hợp cho từng giọng hát và phong cách của ca sĩ. Chỉ có một thiếu sót (cá nhân) nho nhỏ. Tôi rất muốn được thưởng thức giọng hát Thùy Chi trong album này.