When I agreed to design and develop the web book for The American Robin, I did not expect any payment. I wanted to help out my mentor who is a close friend of the author. Furthermore, I wanted to spread the idea of leaving a legacy that anyone around the world could access.

The web book version of The American Robin is a wonderful gift from the author because the website has no ad, no paywall, no popup, no gimmick, and no tracking. Because the web book was intended to be free, I did not want to charge for my contribution. Nevertheless, I took the project as if I was paid in full. I stayed up late on weekdays and spent my weekends working on the book.

When choosing Warbler, designed by David Jonathan Ross, to typeset the book, I used my own license from the Font of the Month Club. Even though DJR’s standard licensing agreement has no restrictions on how many websites can be used, clients should have their own font licensing. After I decided to use Warbler for the book, I contacted David about the font licensing and he was totally cool that I used my own licensing for the web book.

After the web book went live, I spread the word on my blog, portfolio, and social media. I even emailed my friends and family members who liked reading. My job was done and I thanked my mentor for the opportunity to work on the book. She informed me that the author loved the website and thy had been discussing about offering me an honorarium.

I must confess. This was the first time I heard of the term honorarium. I had to look it up in the dictionary. It was an honor to work on the website even without a payment, but I was more than glad to accept an honorarium. I was delighted that my mentor was still looking out for me.

As soon as I received the check for the honorarium, I purchased a license of Warbler. The web book now has its own font licensing. Since I got paid, the type designer should get paid as well. It just felt great doing the fair share.

Why am I revealing this information? It’s a proof how bad I am at doing business. I rather designed for free then getting paid. When not getting paid, I made no compromises in the design and development of the project. If I was getting paid, I had to get approval from the client. My best projects have always been not what my clients want, but what their audiences get out of the project. The ideal projects are when the client, the audience, and the designer are satisfied. This web book is an epitome of that ideal project.

We now have a ping pong table in our basement. It took me a minute to clear up the space. I simply moved everything to another room. My wife’s sister gave us a MD Sports Table Tennis Conversion Top. I used a 6-ft and two 4-ft folding tables from Costco to hold up the table. The full-size ping pong table turned out great.

Đán started to get into ping pong and asked for a table. He is getting pretty good at it. I hope he will stick with it for a long time, or at least until he can beat me. Xuân is also into it. He is already showing some improvements. I hope Đạo and Vương will join us as well.

Playing ping pong brings back my childhood memories at the refugee camp in the Philippines. There was a ping pong table at an open space near where we stayed for six months before we could come to America. The table had no net; therefore, a couple of kids my age and I stacked two bricks and placed a stick on top. We made paddles out of hardboards. All we needed was a ping pong ball. That all it was needed for us to pass the time and to hone our skills.

Now that I cleared one room for the ping pong table and another room for my ski-tuning station, we need to go through all the stuff we accumulated over the years. My wife wouldn’t let me sort them out because I would donate or trash whatever we don’t need. I am getting impatient waiting for her. It drives me crazy that our space isn’t as optimal as it could be. I had seen worse, but our space could have been tidier. I feel guilty that I couldn’t provide a clutter-free space for our kids. It stuck on my mind all the time. I wish I could just ignore it, but I couldn’t.

Once in a while, I like to pick up a writing guide to refresh my memory. Jeffrey Strausser’s Painless Writing will show you how to declutter your preposition, activate your active voice, and smooth out your prose. It’s a painless guide to improve your write, and a quick read too.

In 36 Ways of Writing a Vietnamese Poem, Nam Lê wrote a piece on Vietnamese diacritics titled “Dire Critical.” With lyrical prose, Lê explained the importance of tones. For example, ma has a completely different meaning depending on the accompanying diacritical mark (má, mà, mạ, mã, or mả). Since “Dire Critical” has some useful information, I decided to create a sample page to illustrate Vietnamese typography. Through HTML markups and CSS presentations, I designed the web page to resemble the printed page. The poem is typeset in Bono Nova, designed by Mateusz Machalski and Andrzej Heidrich. Read “Dire Critical” now.

In the past few days, I tried to upgrade from Ubuntu 22.04 to 24.04 twice for two different Droplets, but both failed. The upgrades went through, but I could not restart the servers. I will try again when I have more time, but I need to look for a new home for all of my websites for the long run.

I like the cloud hosting services at DigitalOcean. They are fast, reliable, and easy to manage—until they are not anymore. Management the Droplets is also the downside. Every few months I have to do updates and upgrades. Minor security updates are fine, but a major upgrade is not. I don’t want to manage these servers anymore. I feel the same way Winnie felt when she finally decided to move from DigitalOcean to Opalstack.

I can’t go back to shared hosting. I need cloud hostings like DigitalOcean, but fully managed. I am considering WP Engine for this blog, but then I would need another home for five other sites. I am not in any rush. I still have a bit of time to make the decision. If you have any hosting recommendations, please let me know.

Logo design has always been challenging yet rewarding. It’s not always easy to come up with an effective logo, but it just feels great when you hit the mark. In this book, logo designer George Bokhua presents simple-yet-practical principles to help you get there. It’s a short, informative read. The typesetting for the book is superb. The illustrations are beautiful too.

In early July 2023, I was tapped to help redesign all the graphs for the fourth edition of Economic Analysis for Lawyers, by Henry N. Butler, Joanna Shepherd, and James C. Cooper. The book had over 60 graphs and I illustrated half of them. Another graphic designer did the other half.

I am thrilled to learn that the book is releasing soon. I can’t wait to hold a physical copy in my hands to see how our graphs turned out, but I am going to have to wait patiently for the complementary copy because it costs $172.

This is not a manual book on how to write a poem in Vietnamese. Nam Lê’s poems are personal, political, and a bit diacritical. Though I haven’t fully grasped his language of poetry, I appreciate his lyrical proneness:

The house in my head
I name home.
Though where I’m really from
The dead bird stays dead.

I’ll definitely revisiting this electrifying collection, but I have a few words about the typography. The author’s name is set in a san-serif typeface filling up the entire cover. It is quite striking. The poems inside are set in Minion, designed by Robert Slimbach. They are simple, readable with excellent diacritical marks. Hats off to the designers.

After having a beer for dinner on Saturday, I went to bed with a gout flare from my left foot’s big toe. I woke up the next day, I could barely walk. I had to pop two 2 Aleves.

I am getting fed up with the attacks; therefore, I decided to get on the meds. I paid my internist a visit yesterday and she prescribed me with Prednisone and Allopurinol.

The annoying part about gout attacks is that I can’t rollerblade. As the winter is approaching, I need my feet to be in good shape for skiing and snowboarding. I can’t get gout attacks during the skiing-snowboarding season. I am eager to pick up carving techniques again from the last season.

I am now cutting back on my diet and drinks. Beef is off the menu. Beers and spirits are off at home and at the restaurants with my family. I only drink when hanging out with my drinking buddies. Last month, I dropped over a grant on hard liquor such as Yamazaki, Cordon Bleu, and Midleton. I definitely need to cut back on it as well.

Over the weekend, I accompanied my wife to Boston to meet up with her high school friends from all the way back in Vietnam. For the first time, the gathering was all adults, except for a young daughter who was about to start college at RISD.

Initially, I was planning on staying home with the kids, but her friends urged my wife to take me along so the husbands could hang out. After making some arrangements with my mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and our kids, we were all set to go. I got excited because it was our first trip without the kids since Đạo was born. For the last 15 years, we had been so busy with our kids that we forgot to make time for ourselves.

The trip turned out wonderful. We toured the Boston area for a bit. It’s a vibrant city. Of course, we had tons of food including lobsters and delicious Vietnamese dishes from Dorchester. The best part was seeing my wife laughing with her friends as they reminisced on their childhood stories.

I admired their friendships. I was also glad that they reconnected after all these years. Seeing my wife stepping out of our family zone was a joy. Of course, I appreciated the last one and half decade she devoted to our family, but I also wanted to see her take some time out for herself.

Unlike us with young kids, most of her friends have children entering, attending, or finishing college. The ladies are the rock of their family. They are successful not only in their careers, but also in raising their kids. I have tremendous respect for them.

Thanks friends for the short but sweet time together. Until we cross paths again, take care!