All You Want Me To Do

Will be writing my reflections of my song "All You Want Me To Do" sometime this year end after it was first published on Thir.st at the beginning of the year.

Video URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdmPpGbfbog
Article URL: https://thir.st/blog/celebrity-leader/

For now, here's the chord sheet of my song:

10 Habits of Happy Couples

Found this site - http://www.alternet.org/sex-amp-relationships/10-habits-happy-couples - shared by my Facebook friends called "10 Habits of Happy Couples". I couldn't agree more to what it says.

Personally, I think number 4 and 5 are the hardest to emulate. Once 4 & 5 are in place. The rest will fall in together naturally.

Unfortunately, this is what most couples or people don't have. When put to the grind, relationships crumble entirely because of these 2 pointers.

Hais, when will we learn?

Here's the entire content pasted here.

1. Go to bed at the same time
Remember the beginning of your relationship, when you couldn’t wait to go to bed with each other to make love? Happy couples resist the temptation to go to bed at different times. They go to bed at the same time, even if one partner wakes up later to do things while their partner sleeps. And when their skins touch it still causes each of them to tingle unless one or both are too completely exhausted to feel sexually excited.

2. Cultivate common interests
After the passion settles down, it’s common to realize that you have few interests in common. But don’t minimize the importance of activities you can do together that you both enjoy. If common interests are not present, happy couples develop them. At the same time, be sure to cultivate interests of your own; this will make you more interesting to your mate and prevent you from appearing too dependent.

3. Walk hand in hand or side by side
Rather than one partner lagging or dragging behind the other, happy couples walk comfortably hand in hand or side by side. They know it’s more important to be with their partner than to see the sights along the way.

4. Make trust and forgiveness your default mode
If and when they have a disagreement or argument, and if they can’t resolve it, happy couples default to trusting and forgiving rather than distrusting and begrudging.

5. Focus more on what your partner does right than what he or she does wrong
If you look for things your partner does wrong, you can always find something. If you look for what he or she does right, you can always find something, too. It all depends on what you want to look for. Happy couples accentuate the positive.

6. Hug each other as soon as you see each other after work
Our skin has a memory of “good touch” (loved), “bad touch” (abused) and “no touch” (neglected). Couples who say hello with a hug keep their skin bathed in the “good touch,” which can inoculate your spirit against anonymity in the world.

7. Say “I love you” and “Have a good day” every morning
This is a great way to buy some patience and tolerance as each partner sets out each day to battle traffic jams, long lines and other annoyances.

8. Say “Good night” every night, regardless of how you feel
This tells your partner that, regardless of how upset you are with him or her, you still want to be in the relationship. It says that what you and your partner have is bigger than any single upsetting incident.

9. Do a “weather” check during the day
Call your partner at home or at work to see how his or her day is going. This is a great way to adjust expectations so that you’re more in sync when you connect after work. For instance, if your partner is having an awful day, it might be unreasonable to expect him or her to be enthusiastic about something good that happened to you.

10. Be proud to be seen with your partner
Happy couples are pleased to be seen together and are often in some kind of affectionate contact — hand on hand or hand on shoulder or knee or back of neck. They are not showing off but rather just saying that they belong with each other.

Extreme Sporting - Urban Climbing & Parkour

The first two videos made my palms and the soles of my feet damp with perspiration...No joke. This is a form of extreme sporting called urban climbing. Try not to pee in your pants.

These Russian youths have one hell of a hobby that could send them right straight to hell. Without harnesses, ropes, parachutes or any form of safety climbing equipment, their adrenalin is all they ride on to perform these breath-taking, heart-stopping, jaw-dropping, eyeball-popping, butterfly-breeding stunts.

Here's a little documentary on them.

They also practice another urban extreme sport called "parkour" or "free running" which is "the sport of moving along a route, typically in a city, trying to get around or through various obstacles inthe quickest and most efficient manner possible, as by jumping, climbing, or running" as defined by dictionary.com

"Parkour" or "free running" basically involves jumping over staircases, ramps, rooftop to rooftop, etc...It's basically overcoming urban obstacles with non-layman gymnastic maneuverability and the out-of-this-world ability to break falls. Here's a lil' video compilation of what it is about.

The last video I watched was this super fun "Human Bungee Slingshot - Human Catapult!" video. This one's more try-able and the people who actually did it did some pretty funny stuffs that will get your tummy exercising.

If possible, I'd like to go there and try that out too! You gotta live while you're young right? #YOLO. Haha.

Yup, I'm no adrenalin junkie, but I am sure one adventurous boy that wants to do some of these before I reach a age where I cannot attempt such feats. Haha.

So, go extreme sporting!! Just kidding. Do the ones that you know you'll have a 90% probability of walking out alive. Haha.

To love at all is to be vulnerable

Found this on this webpage...http://theunboundedspirit.com/this-comic-about-love-will-touch-your-heart/. Fantastic depiction of the vulnerability and beauty of love.

God, life and heaven

If only things were this simplistic. But nevertheless, the idea behind this comic is somewhat true in the Christian context.

Do guys ever really get over their 1st girl...

Read this article "Do guys ever really get over the first girl to break their hearts?" on Elite Daily and felt it had rather good descriptions.

Here's the full article if you desire its full load: http://elitedaily.com/dating/sex/do-guys-ever-really-get-over-the-first-girl-to-break-their-hearts/. But not everything on the article sounds agreeable to.

As for this post on my blog, these few excerpts are strikingly the most pertinent illustrations for me...

~~~~~~~

I don’t believe any man ever fully gets over her. Although we know she isn't “the one", and though we know it wouldn't work out even if we tried again, she still remains the fullest memory we have of love; for this reason, she will never be entirely forgotten.

It’s not being the first love that makes the shadow haunt you long after she’s moved out of your life; it’s the love that cuts the deepest, leaving an irreversible scarring. The relationship was very emotional, fluctuating from intense love to intense distaste, to a certain feeling that can only be described as numbing.

Regardless, these girls remain a part of us for the rest of our lives. They are what we base and compare all subsequent relationships to. They are whom we compare a potential new partner to when considering a new relationship. They are the standard that all men live by as far as love and relationships go. The reason this doesn’t change is because the woman we can’t let go of no longer actually exists. Who we remember is not the woman she now is, but rather, a woman she once was.

She is a ghost we keep alive and go back to when things get difficult — the hope for better days that keeps us going.

~~~~~~~

Lemme end this post with this tweet by @thegooglefactz that I think is altogether true:

"Psychology says, you never really stop loving someone; you either never did, or you always will."

How to live life

Had to take a minute off my study to post this. Saw this off quickmeme.com and I fell in love with the quote and illustration. Enjoy and let your mind feast on this morsel of thought :)

"When you were born you were crying and everyone else is smiling. Live your life so at the end, you're the one who is smiling and everyone else is crying."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Lalah Hathaway singing chords / intervals

Chanced upon this video that appeared on my Facebook page. It features an astounding R&B and jazz singer Lalah Hathaway.

The song is totally erratic. This song does not subscribe to any key (like any jazz song). Just go through a few phrases of the song and you will see a few key changes. On top of that, the chromatic note and chord progressions also make the song really hard to sing and play.

But yeah, she pulls it off beautifully in sort of a "live" setting.

The most amazing part is when she sings intervals. She sung out what sounded like chords!! Seek the video to 6:10 and hear her vocal expulsion. It's a harmony coming out, not a single note!

That was MIND-BLOWING. It's my first time encountering a singer singing two notes simultaneously! I went to YouTube more of such videos and then realized that it isn't all too unique. But yeah, packed in this song are fantastic arrangements and it really climaxed at her display of singing out a chord or an interval.

Amazing vocal prowess. Here's the video. Listen to the whole song to get the feel of its intricacy or seek to 6:10 and be stupefied by her sheer control and technique.

Reading until orgasm

Chanced upon this highly controversial yet interesting project called "Hysterical Literature: The Orgasm as an art" carried out by photographer Clayton Cubitt.

So orgasm is now an art? Wow. The definition and boundaries of art are sure being stretched. Haha. As controversial as it may be, whatever was captured on film was raw, sexy, titillating and beautiful. Their reactions are bound to make you smile and giggle along with them.

The author of this post on www.criminalwisdom.com also quipped "The results are an intimate, sexy experience that captures a beauty rarely found in most modern pornography."

Here's how this contentious experiment was carried out:

He takes a woman, gets her to read a book while another project mate of Cubitt's, hides under the table and uses a vibrator to bring the woman reading the book to orgasm.

Their reactions? See for yourself. Link below.
http://www.criminalwisdom.com/hysterical-literature-the-orgasm-as-art/

Imagine by John Lennon

Chanced upon this cute, cartoonist-ic depiction of this all-time classic song: "Imagine" by John Lennon on postimg.org by Pablo Stanley.

So potent and raw are his lyrics. I'm sure this song is the anthem of many people and I daresay this is the anthem of mankind. Because we all desire peace, love, joy and happiness. We don't want war, fights, quarrels, injustice, hate, etc...

His song just goes to show that we, somehow all innately have this benchmark of how life is meant to be. We all have an idea of perfection, a heavenly utopia that we all dream of. It's in the OS (operating system) of our souls!

However, in our best efforts to achieve that dream that John Lennon so beautifully painted in his song, we have created a nightmare. That's because, we are all imperfect beings made for a perfect world that is not Earth.

It all comes back to the origin. Someone has already put the rules of life in place, someone has already put this benchmark of perfection in our hearts, someone has already defined what's right, what's wrong, what's love, what's hate, etc...

Question is, who is that someone? When we find that someone, that transcendent designer of our universe, there we can start to re-align and discover the answer to life's greatest riddle - What on earth am I here for?

Food for thought.

If you don't know this song, here's the lyric video of it on YouTube:



And here's the awesome depiction of "Imagine", drawn by Pablo Stanley.

New blog URL & the history of "Jonny"

For those reading this post now, you're either an ardent follower of my blog or you found my blog through google. Haha.

Either way, hello! :D Haha!

If you didn't realize, I changed my blog URL from historymakers-jonavanlee.blogspot.sg to historymakers-jonnyboy.blogspot.sg.

Why?

Because recently, I was invited to pledge my blog to the Singapore Memory Project (SMP). Here's an excerpt of their invitation:

"On behalf of the National Library Board (NLB), we would like to invite you to pledge your blog to the Singapore Memory Project (SMP)."

I checked out their website, saw what other bloggers had to say, read through the terms and conditions, and decided only to pledge certain posts in my blog after reading their terms & conditions because one of them stated:

"You agree not to post on the SMP Portal any memories, content or any other materials whatsoever that is or could appear to be: untrue, misleading, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, tortious, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, libelous, invasive to another person's privacy or protected data, hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;"

Most of my posts contain very much of my personal opinions and some of them are highly controversial, like really. LOL. So yeah, they are debatable and objectionable depending on your perspective and how you perceive and contextually interpret truth.

So, because I've agreed to share some of my posts on the site, I thought putting my name in my blog URL won't be that wise.

I'd like to keep things semi-anonymous so that those who want to find me, can, and those that don't, won't.

So yeah, that's why I decided to change my blog URL :D

Anyway, for the history of the term "Jonny Boy" it has been "used" by me and on me several times. Lemme trace the history of this nickname:

Around year 2008 - 2009: I was playing Pets Society on Facebook. Yes I know, don't judge me. I just entered NS. LOL!

That was when I randomly nicknamed my pet "JonnyBoyJunior" :D Here's a picture of JonnyBoyJunior! (Yes, there is a Pet's Society album in my facebook albums..LOL)

I still think he's really cute :D LOL!

JonnyBoyJunior playing his electric guitar! :D LOL

I think that was the very first occurrence of the nickname "JonnyBoy" in my life. And it had to make its debut in PET'S SOCIETY -.- LOL!

Also around 2008 - 2009 period, when I was still being mentored by a most awesome, articulate and eloquently cogent ministry leader - Lee Cai Jie - he was calling me "Jonny".

I was also in the ministry he started - Fish4men. One of the most essential ministries that was not well supported by the church :( He was the sole person who called me "Jonny" in church. Haha.

Subsequently, this nickname wasn't really used (other than Cai Jie) until this year, year 2013. Where miss bff and I nicknamed each other "Xuanny" & "Jonny". Like Cai Jie, she was also the sole person to address me as "Jonny" or "JonnyBoy". Haha.

From there, this nickname was revived and I went on to nickname my animal avatar (the cute doe/deer in 1st place below) on Fun Run "jonnyboy..."

My fun run avatar's the doe (deer) in the 1st place. LOL! My doe's nick? jonnyboy..."

Stop judging me! A lot of my friends my age and older also play Fun Run ok? LOL! Anyway, my rating is 5200+ now :D HAHAHA! Kthxbye.

But nothing compared to my sister's rating of 12000+. A few of my other friends like Yong Da & Kelvin also has an imba rating of 12000+ and 13000+ respectively. HAHA! Ok can.

So yeah, that's the brief history of my nickname "Jonny" or "JonnyBoy". LOL.

Anyway, I was free enough to type this post because I came for a tutorial class that I already attended on Monday... -_-" Bravo me. So while waiting to lunch with my friends, I ended up blogging. Kthxbye.

Yup, keep my studies and relationships in prayer! Really need them now :D Haha! Ok, back to the grind...

This is how you lose her

I know, I've been too busy running around, meeting datelines for my bosses and meeting datelines for my reports and essays that I do not have any ME time to blog!! :(

Nevertheless, I shall sneak one post out now.

I read this off my friend's blog and thought it was utterly powerful. Delicately diction-ed and detailed-ly descriptive. It's a good read:

This is how you lose her.

You lose her when you forget to remember the little things that mean the world to her: the sincerity in a stranger’s voice during a trip to the grocery, the delight of finding something lost or forgotten like a sticker from when she was five, the selflessness of a child giving a part of his meal to another, the scent of new books in the store, the surprise short but honest notes she tucks in her journal and others you could only see if you look closely.

You must remember when she forgets. 

You lose her when you don’t notice that she notices everything about you: your use of the proper punctuation that tells her continuation rather than finality, your silence when you’re about to ask a question but you think anything you’re about to say to her would be silly, your mindless humming when it is too quiet, your handwriting when you sign your name in blank sheets of paper, your muted laughter when you are trying to be polite, and more and more of what you are, which you don’t even know about yourself, because she pays attention.

She remembers when you forget. 

You lose her for every second you make her feel less and less of the beauty that she is. When you make her feel that she is replaceable. She wants to feel cherished. When you make her feel that you are fleeting. She wants you to stay. When you make her feel inadequate. She wants to know that she is enough and she does not need to change for you, nor for anyone else because she is she and she is beautiful, kind and good.

You must learn her. 

You must know the reason why she is silent. You must trace her weakest spots. You must write to her. You must remind her that you are there. You must know how long it takes for her to give up. You must be there to hold her when she is about to.

You must love her because many have tried and failed. And she wants to know that she is worthy to be loved, that she is worthy to be kept.

And, this is how you keep her.

I'm still around...

My blog's not dead, NO! It is alive...familiar song? Lols...

EXAMS ARE IN A WEEK'S TIME!!!

No time to blog...only got time to MUG!

Yup, keep me and all my fellow NTU friends in prayer :)

Love,
Jonavan Lee :)

"Problems are Purposeful Roadblocks Offering Beneficial Lessons (to) Enhance Mental Strength. Inner strength comes from struggle and endurance, not when you are free from problems."

Yup, this is my NTU email sign off :) haha! See you around! :D

Vrroom vrroom?

Today, 27/5/2011, Friday, is the day I took my driving test.

Everything went well...or so it seems. No cock up, nothing, everything went smoothly. Tester didn't say much. So when we ended the test, I was pretty confident of passing.

I was still smiling as I walked confidently with my tester to discuss my test results.

Then he took out my evaluation paper, my jaw dropped, heart sank, face turned crestfallen and mind rewinding to the parts that could've caused my failure.

Circuit - Full marks. WHEE!
General Driving - Rabak...in the stupidly, ngeow instructor's eyes.

Here's a breakdown of what happened:

Change lane abruptly - 12 points in total. 3 counts of 4 points.
?? Abrupt? How gradual you want me to turn into the next lane? Haha. Fine, this one give you, I'm reckless.


Incorrect checking of blind spot/mirror - 3 points in total. 2 counts of 2 points.
You know what the tester told me after the test? "You turn your head too much when you look over your shoulder"
-___-"
I check blind spot also not happy, I make you blind on the spot ah! HAHA!

Incorrect braking technique - 4 points in total. 2 counts of 2 points.
I was in 1st gear, about to make a right turn when the light turned amber. So I braked...kinda abrupt braking la so that I won't pass the stop line and fail ma. Aiyo...

Insufficient acceleration - 2 points in total. 2 counts of 2 points, 1st count free.
In the circuit, low speed control is crucial. I have no problems with that...Only twice in the whole test did my vehicle vibrate due to insufficient acceleration.

Aiya, even my seasoned instructors when they drive also sometimes got vibration one...you can't always get perfect biting point what...unless you always step your clutch in la...which is also wrong. Haha.

Roll backwards - Less than 1 metre. 2 points in total. 1 count of 2 points.
Was on the road with a gentle slope/gradient. In that split second when you remove your foot from the brake and transfer it to the accelerator, the car will roll back for that 0.5 seconds. For that I got 2 points -.-"

Then I must pull handbrake and get biting point before moving off meh?? Like in the circuit? Aiyo...

I failed not because I can't drive well or drive safely, it's because of all these small mistakes - which I think are too trivial to deny me of my license - added up.

Oh well, so much for all the justifications. I will go back and book another test date. Better pass the next time man.

Overall, for this test, many ppl told me "Don't sad la...try again". I told them "I'm not sad, I'm pek chek."

Haha. O well, better luck next time Jonavan! :) Oh, wait...I don't believe in luck. Ok, better favour from God next time. HAHA! Jkjk :D All the best next time! :)

Pre-TP-Phase

Tomorrow (26/5/2011) is my last driving lesson!! Really thank God for this divine, last minute lobang. Was praying real hard for a slot a day before my driving test...It didn't come until Monday! Hallelujah! :D

Anyway, just took my 2nd last driving lesson on Monday. The instructor assessed me and I got JUST NICE 20 POINTS!! HU LEE YAA!!! Oh, the agony.

I was quite stupid also la...Minus quite a lot of points for nothing. Like the green arrow come up already I still dreaming of my license, staring into blank space...haha.

And forgetting to change to gear 2 after I come to a complete stop -___-"

Without all these, PASS LIAO LO!

His verbal evaluation went something like this "You are a very good driver. But you are not paying attention. By day dreaming you are telling the tester you are not interested in getting your license! Drive safely! You can drive one, just need to be a safe driver!"

Amen to that one...LOLS!

My first full assessment I got 36 POINTS!! Clear cut failure...Keep forgetting to check blind spots while doing parking -.-" + all the same mistakes I committed for my 20 points one.

Anyway, I really pray that I will pass! Because if I don't, I'll have to take like 4 more lessons to familiarize myself with the NEW test routes!! 6th June onwards the test routes will all be changed...to be more difficult as feedback-ed from all the instructors that took me.

So, Heavenly Father, please let the road conditions be good! And don't let any errant learner drivers in the circuit or on the road or any reckless lao jiao drivers cause me to fail!! I know I'm able to pass one God! So grant me your peace and confidence as I stride into the Driving Centre this Friday! :) In Jesus' most holy, powerful, precious, mighty and glorious name I pray, Amen! :D

Random pictures

It's been real long since I've honed my guitar skills...Well, the past 2 weeks I spent 10hours (2 hours for each of the day) running my guitar frets, learning solos and jamming with my favourite bands :)

Just felt like a taking a random picture...This is what my setup looks like in my bedroom where I train...Haha.

 Jonavan's Jamming Studio :D

And oh, the laptop is wired to the speakers to the left side of the picture. There I blast my music and blast my guitar and jam with musicians from all over the world. :) haha.

Next random picture I decided to post is this...My laptop desktop wallpaper :) Haha.

Yup, a little pictorial peek into my personal life :) Haha.

Fattening Week

Last Thursday was Elmer's ORD. His ORD treat to me - A McDonald's breakfast and 3 curry puffs! HU LEE YA!! I was so full I didn't need to eat lunch.

Good Friday, met Meryl & Jeremy after I had a late lunch and snacked massively on "Best Fries Forever", Taiwan chicken chops and Subway cookies...+ sweet drinks.....

Saturday, went to Regina's Pot-luck event at Xiu Hua's house (will blog about it soon). So much awesome food there!! Ate until I almost puked. HAHAHA! Everyone else was around there too...because the food was too good!

Sunday, dinner with parents at hawker centre. Over-ordered all our favourite food. Eat until stomach nearly burst.

Today, BREAK! Whew...

Go back camp and do PT!!!

And yes, I've been faithfully doing my PT for 2 months already. This is so that I can regain my IPPT SILVER!! Still feel really pissed about it when I talk about it...Hais...Haha.

AND, I'll be booking my TP (Traffice Police test - Driving test) soon! :D God lemme pass! :D

Some FB joke...modified

GRANDPA TO GRANDSON: Go hide, your teacher is here because you skipped school today!

GRANDSON TO GRANDPA: YOU go hide…I told her I'm absent because YOU PASSED AWAY!

LOLS!

Haven't had time to blog lately...or rather, haven't made time to blog lately. I find it quite time consuming to blog so exhaustively about my life.

But what motivates me is next time, 10-20years down the road I can look back at those posts and see how I've grown. Or maybe read it with a bunch of friends or with my wife and simply laugh at the events that made me who I am.

Maybe I can publish it as a book or something. HAHA!


Yup, will update soon! :)

Awesome post...About our primary school days!!

http://jeremysng.wordpress.com/2010/05/08/some-things-i-remember-from-the-90s/

My 2 fav games! Stuffed toy version!

This is super random but I came across this website selling stuff toys of Plants VS Zombies & Angry Birds!!

My two favourite single player, nothing-to-do games now comes in cutesy, hug-able forms! HAHA! Cool right? LOLS!