I try and steer clear of tabular layouts and have since I really saw what CSS could do about 2.5 years ago.

Ever since, I've been encouraging my students to work with CSS instead of tables. Of course college textbooks are years out of date and still promote the use of frames and tabular layouts. (egad!) I hold special lectures for my students to help them convert their tabled websites into CSS driven design.

Locked in a world of teaching very rarely do I get to do any real website design...but now with my new company any website designs I do will be done with semantic CSS design.