Records

Krav Maga tonight, did straight two hours, both the basic and advance class back to back.

I didn't join the rest of the Evangelism Explosion ministry team going out to share the gift of eternal with people today. The team went out and had one confession of faith, a 17-year old guy.

Instead, I, my brother, Steve, Tony, her parents helped Thuy moved into her rented duplex near Texas Christian University today after our Sunday worship service and her band practice. After that, we helped Steve moving things from his shop to his house. Then my brother and I went out to eat with our parents at the Vietnamese Bistro in Garland.

Even though I had learned a lot from the Basic Life Principles red text book given to me by Dennis and Linda, the couple that discipled me, I learned even more from this Basic Seminar with Dr. Bill Gothard. He has an amazing way with using chalk to draw up the most amazing pictures. And the way it is put under different lighting to highlight certain aspect of the pictures. I shared with a whole bunch of folks in my singles group and they all are receptive to attending it next year.

I was planning on working out at Bally's but didn't have time. Went right over to Ethan's 3rd birthday after the seminar.

I ran right over to our small group meeting at Thuan and Hanh's place after the seminar. They just bought a house and this is the first time we met there. Their house is at a great location, right on Custer just north of Park in Plano. I told them I will be coming to ask for permission to place yard sign in their yard all the time.

I can bench 130lbs (two 60 lbs barbell plus the bar) at home but I am conservative at Bally's so as not to embarrass myself, doing only 100lbs (two 45lbs plus the bar). I heard the goal is 150% of your weight. I have a long way to go toward that goal but I am working on it.

Attending the Institute in Basic Life Principles seminar Wednesday night through Friday night and a whole day on Saturday this week at the Plano Centre.

This is the slides Dr. Martin presented at the "Concentrated Poverty Forum" a couple weeks ago at the Federal Reserve Bank Dallas.

We had four teams of 10 people going out sharing the gospel with people today, part of our ongoing EE ministry. We had one profession of faith, two people were presented the gospel but did not want to accept the gift of eternal life just yet. A lot of folks were just not at home.

If it was up to me, Miss Switzerland Lauriane GILLIERON would have been Miss Universe 2006 and Miss USA Tara Conner would have been the runner up. As far as the evening gown, which in my opinion is the most significant factor in selecting the crowning contestant, Miss Switzerland Lauriane Gillieron and Miss Paraguay Lourdes Arevalos had the best and second best gown respectively, eye catching and attention grabbing with their colors. Miss USA evening gown's dark color (somewhere between burgundy and purple) and style (no need for the massive tail) was not all that impressive but her answer to the question about her flaw, wearing her heart on her sleeve, especially the last part about "keeping me humble" was the best in my opinion. Somebody needs to help Miss Japan Kuara Chibana because there is more than just physical difference between the man and woman. But I agree with her about less violence. I thought Miss Puerto Rico Zuleyka Rivera could be great in politics because she has mastered the art of saying a lot but telling nothing with her answer to the question: "What is her definition of success?"

We had a pretty crowded health fair this morning. It was chaotic at first but then everything settled and things went well. We started at 9:00 am and went all the way to 1:00 pm without a break.

We drew blood for hepatitis test for about 120 people. Pam, who works for Baylor, drew blood patient after patient for straight 4 hours. Dr. Son Do stepped in and help ed draw blood as well after the first few minutes and he saw how many were waiting in line. Diane, a volunteer who has her real job working for Gilead Sciences, helped labeling the blood sample all through. Vanessa and I was signing up people with the help of ThuyTien and Nho, who is splitted between our hepatitis station and the prostate station. I made sure we have the patient's contact info so we can get the results to them later and calling people's name off the signup list, lining up them to keep things go smoothly. Many complained why it has been so long and I hadn't called their names. Many jumped from one station to the next hoping to get all the tests done. I was firm and just doing round robin calling people's name off of all the different lists I had. It was not bad at all but I was reminded that human nature never changes.

In addition, we had all kind of other testing: vision, dental, cholesterol, pap smear, bone density, ... as well as giving tetanus shots, all of this free of charge.

Saw Helena and her sister Diane at Tay Do restaurant when we went for "bun bo Hue" afterward. Went to the office for a little bit before stopping by for a workout at Bally's before going home to post this.

We went to the Tin Star at Coit and President George Bush Turnpike for a group lunch today. I ordered a cheesesteak fajitas and the beef was like rubber. Bad choice.

Got off work, went to Bally's for a workout and then headed out to Bob Eden park in Euless for some sand volleyball, picked up a burger from Wendy's on the way.

Pat Buchanan is getting on my nerve with his commentary today: "it's not our war" regarding the current fighting between Israel and Hezbollah. His sister Bay Buchanan also crossed the line when she said that she's going to raise fund to defeat Rick Santorum because he has a different stand on the immigration issue. I agree that Rick's wrong on immigration but how is she getting anything better if Bob Casey became the senator from Pennsylvania?

This week I find myself disagreeing with the position the Ayn Rand Institute takes on the federal funding of embryonic stem cell research. If it's such a potential, why don't we let free market forces take care of things. The drug companies would all jump in to make a big investment for a huge profit later. Private donors always have the option of giving money to research centers at universities. Bush only draws a line on federal funding, he does not ban embryonic stem cell research by anyone. I strongly support the president because there's no reason for the federal government to get involve if you believe in limited government. The federal government especially should not be using my tax dollars to fund something I am morally opposed to. And not just I but a whole bunch if not the majority of Americans. For those of you that are result oriented, tell me one good thing has come as the result of embryonic stem cell. Adult stem cell from umbilical cord has yielded encouraging result for juvenile diabetes. Even if embryonic stem cell should deliver, the federal government still has no business in getting involved. They should stick to national defense and interstate commerce.

Went out and hit some tennis balls with Cynthia and Joe today.

Got home and checked on the primary races in Georgia. Former Christian Coalition chairman Ralph Reed had already conceded to Casey Cagle in the lieutenant governor race. And the most interesting bit of news is that US Rep. Cynthia McKinney is heading into a runoff with Democratic challenger Henry C. “Hank” Johnson, Jr.. Let's hope Georgia voters will send that arrogant "I am above the law" woman home on August 8th.

After the yellow belt test on Saturday, I decided to take a day off from Krav Maga class today, stayed at work a little longer and then went home to catch up on a lot of non-profit works that desperately need to be taken care of.

After today's church service, we had a quick lunch and then headed out to share the gospel. I had the opportunity to share the gospel with one Vietnamese lady in Grand Prairie. She understood everything I presented but would not "abandon" her religion, Cao Dai to convert to Christianity. I told her that it's not so much as exchanging one religion for another but rather that she accepts the gift of eternal life given through faith in Christ. We left her a tract and will continue to pray for her.

I then stopped by Henry and Uyen's house in south Arlington for their son's birthday party before heading back to north Dallas for judge Livia Liu's steering committee meeting. VPS Dallas staff group had an informal working meeting afterward at the Starbucks on Campbell at Central Expressway in Richardson.

Quite a long but productive day!

The Vietnamese Health Professionals Association of North Texas and the Vietnamese Professionals Society - Dallas will have a health fair next Saturday, July 22nd, at Dao Quang temple in Garland. We had a short planning meeting this morning.

I got home, had lunch and rested a little bit before heading to my Krav Maga yellow belt test. We started reviewing everything at 2:00 pm. We went on having our test. We were done at 20 minutes before 6:00 pm. I am now aching all over. I should have tested when I had a couple opportunity previously but had been out of town or conflict of schedule. This time, I made time for it.

I had the opportunity to listen to Dr. Marcus Martin of the J. McDonald Williams Institute, the research arm of the Foundation for Community Empowerment at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas forum on "Concentrated Poverty" today. The other speaker was Dr. Paul Jagowsky, an associate professor at the University of Texas at Dallas.

Dr. Paul Jagowsky advocates government intervention to make sure there a mixed income neighborhood instead of single income neighborhood. In other words, let's mix Highland Park and south Oak Cliff to make sure everyone has problem instead of letting the problem concentrated in one neighborhood. Let's spread murders and other kinds of crimes around so every neighborhood has an equal number of break ins and robberies. Great typical solution from a Harvard educated liberal northeasterner for mitigating the symptoms instead of treating the root cause of the problem.

Dr. Martin advocates individual responsibility with help from the community and free market solution. Education is the key to solve the problem. Your chance of being a murder victim is greatly reduced if you have a college degree, check the statistics here. The highest concentration of residents with a bachelor degree, North Dallas with 55%, has the lowest concentration of poverty. The lowest concentration of residents with a bachelor degree, South Oak Cliff with 6%, has the highest concentration of poverty. If you are moving to Dallas, avoid zipcode 75210, the Frazier neighborhood, and 75215, two that have the highest concentration of single mother and teen pregnancy. Highest crime rate in Dallas concentrated in three zipcodes: 75215, 75216, and 75217. In addition to those three, 75220 and 75243, make up the five of the six zipcodes in the state of Texas with the highest number of parolees.

We had a long, and I mean long, VPS Dallas staff meeting tonight.

Our family got together with Dennis and Linda, Josh and Lora and their sons, Caleb and Micah. Dennis and Linda is doing business in Hanoi and only get back here a couple months during the summer. We had dinner at the new Vietnamese Bistro right next to Hong Kong market in Garland. It's at the southwest corner of Walnut St. and Audelia Rd., just east of Richland college campus.

As one of the cost cutting measures, Nortel shut down its own fitness facility Aralia here in Richardson last month and offered subsidized membership to Bally's Total Fitness to its employees. I think it's a great move even though the employees now pay twice the amount, we get to go to any Bally's location.

I didn't think I worked my biceps that hard yesterday but boy, oh, boy, this morning both of my biceps really ached. I guess the comforting thought is that I can expect muscle growth and bigger biceps. These days, if I cannot make it to Krav Maga class, it's 20 minutes weight exercise and 20 minutes of cardio exercise at Bally's.

Thank God for the much needed rain in and around Dallas the last few days.

Listening to retired general Wesley Clark and the French ambassador to the UN, you would think that Clinton solved the North Korea problem in the late 1990s. So then why do we still have this problem on our hands? If Clinton did not, but only forestalled it, in the exact words of Mr. Clark, then all Clinton did was to pass on the problem to the next president. Not only that, the problem has grown much worse because time is not on our side. Did Clinton move forward with the missile defense system, I don't believe so.

I was out walking with congressman Jeb Hensarling in the Lake Highlands July 4th parade this morning around 8:30 am. It was my first time at this parade and I didn't know that we don't end up where we start. It was just one straight walk starting at the North Highlands Bible Church parking lot to about six blocks down Church road. It ended at the parking lot across from Skyline Park. Jeb took off right away for the Lakewood parade, which started at 10:00 am.

It's a shame that Germany lost to Italy in the last 3 minutes of overtime.

We had a great time BBQ'ing at Paul and Sharon's place and listening to Jason and his wife sharing God's call to full time ministry in their lives.

I always wear my cup but I was especially glad that I had it on because there's this new guy at the Krav Maga class last night who kept bringing his knee high and kicking me right there when we practiced defense and counterattack for static choke from the front.

The night was still young after we got out of the wedding reception so we decided to go see a movie. Got there and we didn't want to wait for Superman Returns nor do I really want to see Cars, an animation, so we went in for The Devil Wears Prada. The movie is really predictable, but not too boring.