That’s awesome 
He sounds super talented. Don’t worry though, almost everyone can get to the same place with time and hard work. It takes me tons of repetition, but it will be worth it.
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I forgot to make a post yesterday since my mom was going to the airport and I helped her out, so today counts for double!
First off, I started reading Chi’s Sweet Home with @Chimmsen and it’s been great! Our time zones are a little wonky to fit together, but we made it work! They are a great reading buddy and now my mornings are a little more exciting as well. The manga is a little above my level I admit, but it’s meant I’ve learned a lot of new stuff I might not have been exposed to otherwise, so it has its own merits.
And very exciting today, I did a meet and greet with the local Japanese teacher I’ve mentioned. She’s very sweet and her schedule works well with mine, so my first lesson with her is on Monday! I’m looking forward to it, the one thing about learning from textbooks or lesson libraries is that if you don’t quite understand something or the wording used is confusing you can’t just ask the book to spell it out differently for you, so a teacher will be a great benefit to my learning.
I kept up with my reviews yesterday, but today I kind of slacked off because after lunch I got hit with some awful cramps and my past self was wonderful enough to put an empty bottle of ibuprofen back into the cupboard instead of buying a new one, so I was basically incapacitated with a heating pad on the couch for half the day lol. I’ll be sure to catch up tomorrow though. (And restock on some pain killers…)
I would do those reviews right now, but it’s getting late and I’m tired so I’m sure they can survive for one night.
Waterfowl picture of the day:
Common Eider photographed by Tony DeSantis on iNaturalist
PS: If you have never heard it before, please allow yourself the joy of listening to what these guys sound like because oh my gosh. Noises of all time.
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Those are courtship sounds right? 
I love watching courtship behaviour in out local birds, courtship feeding is my favorite (for small birds at least, doves feeding each other is quite uncute).
Hope you’ll have a pain free day tomorrow (or at least more ibuprofen).
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They’re so amazed and astonished! 
“OooOOohh!”
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Another day, another 40 new vocab for my SRS. I totally slept in today, so me and my reading buddy decided to skip today. It’s rare that I’m not up by 8am these days but I guess yesterday had my body worn out. I’ve also noticed that I haven’t really been using Bunpro the last while, I encounter both learn and encounter grammar often enough through reading, that it feels somewhat redundant to use SRS for it, I kind of rather put that energy into learning new vocab instead, so I think I’m going to leave it on the back-burner for the time being. And that feels doubly so since my lessons with my Japanese teacher now will have a very heavy emphasis on grammar, since picking up new vocab isn’t really a problem for me.
Speaking of which, tomorrow is my first lesson with my new teacher! I still can’t believe that I was able to find a local Japanese teacher, through word of mouth no less! I don’t live in a super big city or anything, so I feel really lucky. Especially since her charge per lesson is very within my budget, which was a concern for me. Platforms like italki charge in USD which let me tell you, the conversion from CAD right now is rough. 
I’m so excited to learn from her!
Waterfowl picture of the day:
Cackling Goose photographed by Jefferson Lee on eBird
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Had my first lesson with my Japanese teacher today, and it was amazing! I’m really excited to work with her more. Today in general I was just on a roll studying, I probably got 5-6 hours in I was just really enjoying it. Some days learning just feels even better than usual and you have to take advantage of it, so I did. I feel like I’m really finding my pace again after my big break, I’m happy that I’m getting back to the level I used to be at.
Waterfowl picture of the day:
Northern Shoveler photographed by Brad Vissia on eBird
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Well said! 
Such a great photo!
Somehow, reminds me of this imeowge
Anyway, congratulations on getting back into your pace!
Best of luck with your studies! 
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It was my intention to try not miss posting a study log again, alas, I was distracted by having fun with my friends last night until I was ready to pass out and too tired to want to make one. Nothing really exciting yesterday though, I didn’t study much outside of reviews since I spent the vast majority of the day with my buddies.
I’ve noticed once again I’m getting faster reading, and my listening comprehension is getting sharper too, so I can definitely see the progress I’ve made in general. The progress I’ve made in WaniKani this week though? Abysmal, 8 days and I still haven’t leveled up. I was wondering to myself why this one was taking so long, then I realized that the past week I haven’t really been doing my reviews hourly and only really doing them when they pilled up, which was really hindering the speed of the SRS. Being aware of that now, I will endeavor to properly check up on my reviews every 1-2 hours from now on.
Also, I’ve been watching Pokemon Concierge in Japanese, and it’s very simple and cute I recommend it if you want something to practice listening comprehension with words and grammar that still make sense at a lower level, though the Japanese names for the Pokemon can be a little confusing sometimes.
Waterfowl picture of the day:
Mallard Duck photographed by Blake Ross on iNaturalist
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The last few days have been unusually busy for me, so I had been to busy or tired at the end of the day to update my study log so I’ll go over what I’ve done in the last few days since my last one.
I finally got to level 6! I also decided to install some userscripts, specifically double check and pitch info, and I’ve started failing vocab that I can’t remember the pitch accent of correctly. Needlessly tough? Maybe, but I think in the long run it will be in my favour. I’ve also been making sure to check up on my dashboard much more often so I don’t have a situation like the last level where it took me a long time to level up. I did fall behind on my other SRS app a little bit because of the chaos of the last few days, but I caught up on them tonight. In the same vein, I didn’t do as many new vocab lessons as I would have liked because of time but that’s alright. I also have my next lesson with my teacher tomorrow, so I’m quite excited for that! I had planned to do my reading challenge today too, but I didn’t end up having time because I almost forgot it was my dads birthday. I’m bad with dates! Forgive me!
Waterfowl picture of the day:
Red-breasted Goose photographed by Maryse Neukomm on eBird
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Update: I’m not dead! Had a lot going on, and couldn’t keep up with doing wanikani, I’ve kept up doing reviews but haven’t accepted any new lessons until things stabilized, which they have no! Sadly, that meant I didn’t reach the goal that I had for myself last year, but things happen! You can’t control life, after all. Regardless, I’m happy to get back on the horse and I’ll be posting updates here again.
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