Vance Tran - Graphic & Web Design

Overall, I’m pretty satisfied with my progress on the new years resolutions. There’s definitely room for improvement, though.

1. Blog once a week – Fail!
   Need to get back into the routine!
2. Draw with Wacom tablet once a week – Fail!
   I did one doodle this week with Alex and Jenn, but that doesn’t quite count.
3. Make a vector graphic once a week – Fail!
   Sure I make them at work from time to time, but I need to make more creative stuff at home.
4. Take a picture once a week – Success!
   I took several pics. Just need to post them somewhere.
5. Learn 1 recipe per month – Success!
   Baked Ziti! Inspired by an episode of Heroes, no less
6. Read 1 book per month – Fail!
   Man, I need to get to Snowcrash…
7. Exercise regularly – Success!
   I’m actually gaining some muscle mass. Yay!
8. Be more thoughtful & considerate – Fail!
   Need more work in this dept…
9. Budget – Success!
   I didn’t go over budget this month, woot!
10. More sleep (7-8 hrs) – Success!
    I’m definitely sleeping more than I was in December. There just aren’t enough hours in the day. 7 hrs seems to be a happy compromise.

I did a nice write-up on the wonders of Luong Hai Ky #2 in Mira Mesa, a Chinese-Vietnamese restaurant. I also included a not-so-subtle plug for JobGrades in my photo of their menu.

I don’t know if this is technically legal according to New Years Resolutions statutes and bylaws, but I’m going to revise my resolutions so that they are less daunting.

Also I’m going to cut down and tweak the list according to the SMART guide on Lifehacker:

• Specific. Don’t just say “Lose weight.” Decide to “Lose 12 pounds.”
• Measurable. Instead of “Be better about corresponding with old friends,” decide to “Send out birthday and holiday cards to my high school friends.”
• Achievable. “Be the perfect employee/mom/sister/spouse” is an admirable goal, but nobody’s perfect, no matter how resolved they are. Make your resolution something that’s possible—like, “Improve next year’s performance review by at least one grade.”
• Realistic. You’ve only got so many hours in the day, so make your goals realistic based on what resources and tools you’ve got on hand. Learning how to milk a cow, for example, is less realistic for someone who lives in the middle of Manhattan.
• Timely. Since these are New Year’s resolutions, set goals you can reach at most within the next 12 months. Giving yourself a “deadline” of sorts will help you figure out where you should be when while tracking your progress.

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Here’s an update on the progress of my New Year’s Resolutions.

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I’ve always had a mental list of resolutions, but never jotted it down. Perhaps it will help to get it down in text. In no particular order…

1. Blog once a week
2. Draw with Wacom tablet once a week
3. Learn 1 recipe per month
4. Read 1 book per month
5. Take a picture once a week
6. Exercise regularly
7. Be thoughtful
8. Be considerate
9. Be charitable (i.e. NPR donation)
10. Pay for things I care about (i.e. music)
11. Budget
12. Read more productivity, art, and design feeds
13. Drink tea
14. Take vitamins
15. More sleep (7-8 hrs)

In episode 1, season 5 of The Office, Pam worked on this awesome portrait of Dwight Schrute in ASCII Art form as her summer project. Now you can download it from the NBC site.

Dwight Schrute in ASCII art form PDF (in case NBC takes their copy down)

I attended Comic-Con International in San Diego last weekend and boy was it crowded. Rumors were circulating that it will be moved to Los Angeles or Las Vegas in the future and that may not be a bad plan. Even with all the masses of people, it was still pretty enjoyable. My favorite thing about the show was seeing all the clever costumes folks were wearing. In the photo, Jenn the Sim is about to get shanked by the Team Fortress 2 Spy. How tragic!

After watching Robert Llewellyn’s “Making Do” videos about his year-long boycott against consumerism, I thought it would be “fun” to try it myself for a month. Well, folks, here’s the first casualty: broken sunglasses. These $19 sunglasses from REI have lasted me about two years and the screws have been coming loose off and on. Today I totally lost the screw, so I could find a matching screw… but I was quite tempted to just buy another pair. I was reminded by Jenn that I shouldn’t be so consumerific, so I just popped a paper-clip into into the screw slot for the drive home.

File this under “First-world problems.”

BREAKING: Matt has kindly volunteered to fix my sunglasses. Woot.

I snapped this photo of the Ubuntu Hair Studio from a San Diego, CA deals and coupons magazine. Odd. It appears Mark Shuttleworth is expanding the original Ubuntu Linux brand name to the beauty industry. Actually, this makes perfect sense. Although geeks tend to thrive in dark environments, constantly clenching their computers, they need to be treated like queens every once in a while too.

Huge coffee cups are wonderfully versatile. I like to put soup, rice, water, juice, and soda into mine. I use it for nearly any humanly edible or potable item… except coffee. It also provides a low intensity workout for us skinny-armed office-workers.