We were at a model train show and Dao spotted a small table with small trains. He told me, “Daddy, that’s a very small, tiny, little engine.” Even the man behind the booth was surprised how small Dao had described his trains.

While stuck at the red light I said, “Come on, I want to go home.” Dao followed up, “Please green light, we want to go home.”

At another stop light he spotted a man crossing the street and asked me, “Daddy, why is he walking home?” I reply, “He’s walking because he doesn’t have a car.” He went on, “Why doesn’t he have a car?” I said, “Because he doesn’t have money to buy a car.” I wanted to give him the value of money so I went on, “Like when you want to buy a toy, you have to have money. Do you know where the money come from?” He responded, “From the piggy bank.” I was like, “No, no. You have to work to earn money.”

As for out lil Dan, he has been mumbling quite a bit lately. He baby-talks all the time and has started to repeat what we say. Like when we say his name, he would say it back but not quite correct yet. He also knows the word “đèn” (light). Every time I say the word “đèn,” he would repeat it and look up to the lights. We’re predicting that he’ll probably talk more than his older brother since he already started early.

If one thing I learned from my professor in my Advanced Typography class, it has to be widow. Every time he saw a widow in our paragraph, he would cross it out with his black pen. While widow is easier to control on a printed page, it is much harder to do on the web because you do not have control of how your texts would be filled into the visitor’s device. I have looked at many of my favorite sites and I see widows everywhere.

Out of curiosity, I tweeted my boy Tim Brown to see if he has any suggestion and he pointed me to the Widow Tamer. I actually heard of it in the past, but was not interested simply because it requires JavaScript. My practice has always been to avoid using JavaScript as much as possible unless I absolutely have to. I looked into CSS solution, but it is not being widely supported yet. So I had a bit of a dilemma. Should I have widows and no js or should a have a bit of js and no more widow. I went with the latter for now simply because I want to avoid widow. The js file is actually fairly tiny so it doesn’t do much harm to the overall performance. Maybe I can replace it with CSS in the future.

Ngoài trời vẫn ưu ám. Tin thần vẫn ảm đạm. Nhưng trong lòng thì nhè nhàng. Lớp học tạm xong. Chỉ đợi đến thứ Tư nộp project cuối cùng. Đang nhờ bả xã làm thủ công dùm. Tôi thiết kế thì khá đẹp mà hế đụng đến cắt, dán hoặc làm production là không thể được. Nên tôi vẫn thích làm web hơn graphic design nhiều. Có làm graphic đi nữa thì chỉ thiết kế thôi còn phần production thì ai muốn làm gì thì làm.

Từ ngày ăn cari dê bệnh liên miên cho đến hôm nay. Không biết bị trúng thực hay trúng gió hay trúng cafe. Cũng sáng hôm đó được cái free drink của Starbucks. Vào order ly cối coffee frappaccino. Vậy thôi còn tham lam nên chơi thêm 3 shots expresso. Uống xong tinh thần như đang lên mây. Đã vậy thôi trưa còn thèm hủ tiếu mì cari dê ở La Cây Chợ Lớn. Có cari dê mà không có bia thì hơi thiếu thốn nên chơi thêm một chai bia Corrona lạnh. Ăn uống no nê thì có cảm giác như xuống địa ngục. Ngồi trong văn phòng mà ngủ gục nên đi bộ cho dê nó xuống. Đi bộ trời gió lại không chịu mặt áo ấm.

Có lẻ là ba thứ dồn vào nên mấy hôm nay bịnh gần chết. Nhờ vợ cạo gió cho ăn cháo trắng nên hôm nay mới khá lại được. Có lẻ bệnh nên tin thần khủng quảng nên viết ra tùm lum tùm la. Có cái blog là vậy đó. Nhiều lúc trúc hết tâm sự rồi mới thấy rằng có nên viết tất cả những gì trong đầu không? Bây giờ không còn comment nửa nên có cảm giác như là một mình viết một mình đọc. Cho nên muốn nhảm bao nhiêu thì nhảm chẳng ai để ý. Vả lại tôi viết tiếng Việt ngoài tôi ra còn ai mà hiểu được nửa?

Diana Krall pays homage to the Ziegfeld girls by dressing up quite sexy on the cover of her latest album Glad Rag Doll. The change of the image also signifies the departure of Krall’s musical direction. She puts jazz standards aside and goes all the way back to the ’20s and ’30s. The selection might be obscure to most listeners, but very familiar to Krall who spent her youth absolving her family’s record collection.

Glad Rag Doll kicks off with a fun, mid-tempo swing “We Just Couldn’t Say Goodbye.” What makes the old tune so invigorating is the way she plays around with the lyrics. “Listen ladies and gentlemen / Here’s what happened to us,” she says. Instead of singing the next bars to tell us what happened to her love story, she scats. The result is quite clever.

Producer T Bone Burnett plays a key role in the album success. The best thing he has done is putting guitarist Marc Ribot in the same studio with Krall. His accompaniment on the title track is a proof that Ribot is the master of understatement who undertands emotion is much more essential than techniques. On “I’m a Little Mixed Up,” however, he switches up his distorted, rocking riffs against the slapping backbeat provided by bassist Dennis Crouch and keyboardist Keefus. The strong rhythm section gives Krall the freedom to explore the good old country bluesy licks on the piano.

Vocal wise, Krall is still at the top of her game. The cover “Lonely Avenue” showcases Krall’s raw vocals over the gritty feedback of Ribot’s guitar. With Glad Rag Doll, Krall and her musicians had successfully brought old-school songs into the new century.

In retrospect, design was not something I intended to do with my life. I actually didn’t even know what design was. When I started college, I picked the path my cousin thought I was good at. She sold me on communication major at La Salle University. In my mind, communication sounded cool and I would be controlling the board in a TV station or a music production. In my freshman year, reality struck. Communication was the least that I wanted to do. I hated public speaking. I still hate doing it now unless I have to.

After getting through the first year, I wanted out. I was going to switch to Computer Science, even though I didn’t have any passion for it. Ms. Cross at the Upward Bound Program got me into Millersville University with a major in Computer Science. I was ready to move back to my mom’s house, but then I heard about a new major coming out at La Salle called Digital Arts & Multimedia Design. The new major sounded way cooler than Computer Science so I decided to stay.

The very first class of the program was learning Photoshop and I was hooked. In my sophomore year, I landed a paid internship at Trump Maria as a graphic designer. I got to stare at a computer screen all day. I didn’t even know how to use Mac OS 9. I told my mentor that I had decided not to become a graphic designer. Not sure what prompted me to tell him that. Maybe it was out of frustration. It turned out to be a good decision. I was able to focused my time and effort on web design.

In my junior year, I landed another paid internship at Unisys. Once again I was geting paid for doing nothing. I got bored, quit and joined my classmates at WePlayIt, a startup gig. We made the site and created some Flash comic strips. The site launched all of us was let go.

After graduation, I bounced around advertising agencies. They wouldn’t hire me fulltime. They just called me in whenever they needed me. I ended up working at Staples and Donnelley. One day I got a call from Vassar and that when design took off for me. I spent five years at Vassar working with a handful talent designers on both print and web. I also took on small freelance gigs on the side.

Then I moved to the George Washington University School of Business as a web developer. As my full-time job moved me further and further away from design, I took on more freelance projects to keep my design in the game. When I took on the web services developer at George Mason School of Law, I am moving even further away from design. In addition to maintaining the school’s various CMS, I am also responsible for server administration.

Then I learned about the graduate graphic design program at George Mason School of Art, I handed in my application and was accepted. Now I am back learning where I started in graphic design. I still have no passion for graphic design. It costs way too much money and papers. The design concept, however, would help me tremendously in my web design. I really hope that the Art School would include more web design classes in its curriculum. I will be taking advanced web design next semester. We’ll see how that goes.

Height: 29.74 (50%)
Weight: 22lbs 7oz. (75%)
HC: 18.5″ (75%)

His height at 50% is understandable. Both of his parents are pretty short. His head is now as big as Dao’s and his weight will surpass his brother pretty soon if he’s keep eating the way he does. I can feed him all day long if I wanted to. He understands when we ask him to clap his hands and weave goodbye. He’s babbling quite a bit already. He seems to be a happy kid. He laughs pretty loud, but he screams even louder. He hasn’t shown anything that he liked except for food.

In the second half of the graduate seminar class, we ditched the textbook and picked up a real design project. Between myself and three other graduate students, we decided on making a marketing campaign to promote the MA & MFA degree at George Mason School of Art. Right now the school has one MFA and four MA students.

After many brainstorm sessions, we came up with a tagline: “Real World Design.” Here is the message we want to send out to potential students:

Here at Mason, our design programs are taught by and for real world professionals. People who eat, drink and live this stuff. From websites to environmental graphics to ad campaigns seen by millions, a Mason MA or MFA in Design means your portfolio will be filled with real world work. Because it’s not just a design degree. It’s your profession.

Once we had that down, we agreed that featuring recent graduate students would be the best strategy. So we picked out two students and created our campaign around them. After we came up with the branding (look and feel, typography and images), we split up the work. One student created the posters. One created the brochure. One created an email postcard. I was responsible for the landing page.

We presented the project to the dean of the School of Art and she immediately wanted to use the materials to promote the graduate program. I am so glad that we got to do a real world design project in our class. So if you’re a graphic design and looking to get a master, join us!

You’re turning one today my dear and you have lived through the one of toughest years of our lives yet. While life is rough, I am thankful to have you in my arms every night. Your presence keeps me going. Watching you sleep is the most peaceful moment of my day. Seeing you standing on your own feet has to be one of the greatest joys of my life.

It won’t be too long before you start to walk. You have started talking quite a bit already. You can tell the different between strangers and the ones you see everyday; however, you play with anyone who interacts to you. You still have a great appetite. Like me, you don’t turn down food. Feeding you is such a rewarding experience. I don’t have to force you. You just eat until you’re full. You have turned down baby food. At times we restrict you from a certain food to avoid allergies. Once we have a better idea of your tolerance, I promise you that you can have anything that we eat.

One thing I would love to see you change is to stop exploring everything with your mouth and tongue. Once you get over that, I’ll be more relaxed and let you roam free. For now we have to keep an eye on you at all time.

Happy birthday, love.

Thanh Thảo returns to the club once again. Her new release features one track that clocks over an hour of nothing but Nonstop heavy-hitting beats weaving together a handful of trendy, sugary, catchy, dated pop hits. What makes the album shines, however, is that the thumping, pounding productions work toward her advantage.

The magic wand behind the album is producer Bảo Lư. Not only he knows how to cover up Thanh Thảo’s flaws and limited range, he also transforms the banal tunes into something more creative. He manages to make Thanh Thảo sounds more convincing underneath the chaotic beats. Thanh Thảo is no longer just singing about her broken heart. She’s burying her soul inside the thunderous productions. She’s ready for revenge. Fuck you for breaking her heart. She’s going to show you what the fuck you’re missing out.

Although I am getting way too old for the club shit, Nonstop beats the fucking blue out of me.

Đức Tuấn bores me. His delivery is badly repetitive. He locks himself into the broadway singing style that isn’t doing him any good for Vietnamese music. Lời Tôi Ru Như Mơ, his latest offerring of Từ Công Phụng’s romantic ballads, meets the standard, but far from outstanding.

Once again Đức Tuấn invested top-notch arrangements, which have become his standard, for his album, but his singing has become quite predictable and mechanical. He treats each word with so much care and calculation that it takes away from the emotional essence. Even when he injects his soul into the songs, it feels calculated, which ended up sounding so fake. On “Tự Tình Mùa Xuân,” the simple romance is nowhere to be heard because the song has turned into a musical broadway soundtrack. On “Trên Tháng Ngày Đã Qua,” he is terribly off-key trying to make the song sounds new. The result is disruptive and extremely awkward.

With the exception of “Kiếp Dã Tràng,” Lời Tôi Ru Như Mơ has similar song selection to Tuấn Ngọc’s Giọt Lệ Cho Ngàn Sau. The caliber of Đức Tuấn’s, however, is nowhere near Tuấn Ngọc’s classic.