I am not yet a classical fiend, but I already am hooked on Michel Camilo’s jaw-dropping virtuosity. Backing up by the vigorous BBC Symphony Orchestra, jazz pianist Camilo displays his exemplary classical techniques on Concerto for Piano and Orchestra. The 15-minute opening track alone is captivating and the energetic “Tropical Jam” is highly addictive. Duke and I have been enjoying this album every night until he goes to sleep. Check out “Caribe,” an electrifying solo piano.

I signed the petition to stop the violence and help save Bat Nha Monastary, which is under severe governmental pressure to be abandoned. Find out more info at the Petition Site, sign and spread the word.

The banning of Ban Mai’s Trinh Cong Son: Vet Chan Da Trang from releasing in Viet Nam piqued my curiosity. Trinh Cong Son is without a doubt one of the greatest songwriters of Viet Nam and many books have written about his life and his music. Why is this one prohibited?

In the biography section, Ban Mai briefly, unintentionally rubbed the sensitive spot in regarding to Trinh Cong Son’s neutral position of the war, which didn’t sit well with a few high-ranked officials. That was enough to cease the distribution of the book.

Vet Chan Da Trang was originally a thesis; therefore, only 66 out of 282 pages are reading materials. The rest is just appendix of song lists and lyrics. The author had done a decent job of keeping the biography part concise, yet she only scratched the surface when delving into his lyrical analysis. She drew mostly from other sources to explain his lyrical craftsmanship instead of providing her own interpretation. As a result, the book is disappointedly thin on contents.

Dan Cederholm is tha CSS man. His two titles, Web Standards Solutions and Bulletproof Web Design, are two invaluable resources I keep at hand for references. While there are many different ways to write CSS, I always prefer Dan’s simple approaches. As a designer himself, Dan knows exactly what issues we go through and he offers the straightforward, bulletproof solutions to solve the problems. When it comes to CSS, Dan is always at the top of his game.

Like his previous books, Handcrafted CSS is very focused. The contents are lean and concise but insightful on topics including image-free rounded corners, RGBA colors, and easy float management. Ethan Marcotte has contributed a very informative chapter on fluid layout, especially his formula for turning pixel unit into percentage unit.

Throughout the book, Dan encourages readers to design with “progressive enrichment.” With fast-advancing browsers like Safari and Firefox, now’s the time to experiment and implement new CSS technologies. He argues, “…by giving visual rewards to the browsers that can handle these advanced CSS properties, you’re creating flexible, easily maintained designs that push the development of these new standards forward.” After learning his case studies, I am convinced.

So if you have to make your web site looks the same in all browsers, including Internet Explore 6, than this book is not for you. But if you want to make your site look good on most browsers and great on a certain ones than Handcrafted CSS is for you.

The DVD comes with the book provides 10 guidelines that serves as a checklist for making bulletproof designs. Most of the tips are from Bulletproof Web Design. If you have the book, you probably don’t need the DVD.

Nowadays young singers try to cover timeless songs, but with not much success. Trinh Hoang Hai is an elderly man who could almost do the justice to the classic tunes on his debut Bien Hat. Though lack in techniques and range, he has a raspy voice and an understated approach to ballads. Unfortunately, his use of vibratos killed his effortless delivery. On Tu Cong Phung’s “Mat Le Cho Nguoi” and Pham Duy’s “Thuyen Vien Xu,” he sings like a man in constipation trying to push and pull his way through. His rendition of Trinh Cong Son’s “Ru Em” and Anh Bang’s “Hoa Hoc Tro” are the only two tracks where he sounds less shaky. If he dropped the pulsating effect altogether, his flow would have been so natural.

When a band plays together for 15 years, the members breathe the same air and that was how the Tierney Sutton Band holding down the tiny-ass Blues Alley on Monday night. The band, which consisted of Tierney Sutton (vocals), Christian Jacob (piano), Kevin Axt (bass) and Ray Brinker (drums), performed together as a unit.

Ms. Sutton was not just a jazz singer. She was an integral part of the group. She used her voice as an instrument. Trading lines with the instrumentalists, Sutton always played around with her vocals, especially on the up-swinging tunes. On “What a Little Moonlight Can Do,” Sutton showed her remarkable sense of rhythmic by scatting and catching up with Ray Brinkers’s speedy tempo. Together the dynamic duo gave the standard a complete makeover. “Cry Me a River” also got a fantastic cover with an original arrangement and vocal treatment. “I Got a Kick Out of You” was fun, energetic and very unique. Love the opening bass solo, sensational piano improvisation, vigorous brushwork and Sutton’s playful scatting.

Alternating between fast swing and slow meditation, the band played some of the materials off its latest album, Desire including “It’s All Right With Me,” “Then I’ll Be Tired of You” and “Heart’s Desire.” The show was a perfect escape for a Monday night. My only dissatisfaction was that it was way too short. I wish the band covered my favorite “You Are My Sunshine.”

Cu Dao is wearing us out with his constant energy. He wouldn’t stay still and always wanted us to play or talk with him. He would roll over whenever we put him down on a flat surface. Yesterday he almost rolled off his car seat, which were sat on a chair, before I had a chance to buckle him up.

Whenever Dana feeds him, he would kick and move to all type of positions. As usual, Dana would bring him to bed in the middle of the night so she could feed him and then sleep. Last night Cu Dao didn’t want to sleep. He stayed wide awake and kept on talking while both of us were exhausted. He rolled over, talked and talked. I rubbed his back gently and suddenly I felt the wetness on my cheek. He was licking me. I was so tired and the fresh milk on his lips felt nice so I let him kissed me or drooled all over my face for a bit. I must admit. I enjoyed it.

A Flash trailer for Thirsty is now online. This is a collaborative effort between the author, Kristin Bair O’Keeffe, who wrote the script, Jacqueline Francis who came up with the music and myself who created the motion graphic.

Kristin had done a great job of gathering all the pieces together and planned out what exactly what she wanted to express. Jacqueline produced the score based on Kristin’s storyboard. Since both the music and the script were tightly structured, I knew I couldn’t get the synchronization correctly on the first time. I had to reworked the animation to find the right flow as well as the right timing. Fortunately, I got both down perfectly the second time.

I am satisfied with the final product. I spent a whole night after a five-hour drive on it plus a couple of hours here and there. So go check it out!

Last week Dana and I had determined that we would spend our Saturday working on our retaining wall, a project has been pushed off for way too long. Saturday morning, we went to Hai Ky Mi Gia for a savory breakfast before we work on the project. We did a bit of grocery shopping at Eden and a farmer market near by our house then headed home. It was time to feed Cu Dao. Then we dropped him off at her sister’s house so her mother could babysit him.

Her mother made lunch and invited us to join them before heading to Home Depot. While having lunch, we realized that we didn’t measure the space. We went back to do the measurement so we could get the right amount of bricks. We hopped on YouTube to see how to build the retaining wall.

Now we are ready to head to Home Depot to get the bricks. We would need about 100 pieces so we were thinking of renting a truck. We drove to Home Depot. Instead of making a left turn to Home Depot, we made a right turn into the Korean supermarket. Dana ran in and checked to see if it has what we had been waiting for. A minute later, my phone rang and she said, yes, park the car and come in. Half an hour later we walked out with two big-ass jackfruits about 20 pounds each and the rain started to pour. We looked at each other and knew exactly what each other was thinking. Without a word, we laughed and drove home. We enjoyed the jackfruits. I also made a banging bap xao tom kho for dinner.

A friend has written a post on how his girlfriend flipped out when he mentioned to her someone look like his ex.

While I am not an expert on relationship, I have learned a thing or two from my experience. Don’t ever ever ever mention your ex to your current. To a woman, mentioning your ex means that you’re still thinking about her. You still miss her or have a thing for her. So don’t talk about your ex because it could only hurt your current relationship.

Not only that you don’t mention about your ex, you also don’t mention anything that associated with her. If your ex does nails, don’t talk about nails. If you say nice things about nails, she would be like, If you like nails so much why don’t you go back to her and you can can your nails done everyday. If you talk trash about nails, she would be like, You still mad and jealous because you still love her.

So you can see, you lose either way. Actually I do not want to hear about my wife’s past either. If I don’t know about it, I don’t think about it. I can’t change the past anyway so why putting that in the picture. Just focus on the presence and be happy with what you have.