November 13th!
Just a little bit of listening so far today, but perhaps I’ll do some more this evening.
I listened to an episode of Nihongo con Teppei for Beginners, which was about how its fine to make mistakes because everyone does 
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Thank you everyone who wished me well 
To clarify, I do not think this is covid - I’ve taken 2 home tests and come up negative. I just have sore throat (with no/little voice), congestion, and lower energy which points to a run of the mill cold to me. I canceled my work trip to be safe, but I have no fears for my health 
Today I listened to some random 妖怪 videos and this one: #最強のミステリー小説10選 #本紹介 - YouTube
I’m linking it because it has baked in Japanese subs and she speaks quite slowly compared to most book reviewers I’ve seen. Might be good practice for those looking for chill, natural content.
I don’t really agree with her choices however. I’ve read a handful of them, or other books by the same author, and only one of them is a book I’d personally put on such a list. Her #1 choice is actually a book I actively disliked and didn’t finish 
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November 13th:
I only watched a single video from Comprehensible Japanese today.
It was about some riddles with the Japanese language. While I understood most of it on the first try, I did not get any of the riddles before she showed the solution.
This video was a bit more difficult than the ones from yesterday and had a bunch of words that I didn’t know. Again she depicted everything, making it easy to pick up their meaning.
After that I started to compile a list of some relevant resources from the old Listening Challenge thread to test out, so the threshold is lower next week, when I’m looking for something to listen to.
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November 13th
What did I listen to?: A Series of Unfortunate Events Ep 7, 8, 9
How much time did I spend listening?: 135 min-ish (3 episodes)
I watched…3 episodes back to back? Because this show’s vibe just fit with what I was in the mood for today? I think this is my new record for most Japanese listened to in one day lol. I did take some random breaks in the middle, and I didn’t pay super close attention the whole time (I was going for more extensive listening than intensive listening). But I am deeply enjoying the Japanese interpretation of the Carmelita Spats character lmao, like the voice actress they got for her is great To me, her voice tone sounds just shy of anime-level cutesy, which is exactly perfect for this character (for those unfamiliar, Carmelita Spats is this absolutely horrid little girl who wears pink frilly dresses and thinks she’s the cutest person in the world when in reality she’s a rude brat who bullies everyone). In the English dialogue, her favorite way to insult people is by calling them “cakesniffers.” In Japanese, this gets translated as “かしくんくん,” which sounds adorable and insulting and exactly like something a Japanese Carmelita Spats would say
Insult breakdown:
かし - as in お菓子; confections; sweets; candy; cake
くんくん - “sniff-sniff (of an animal)” (it’s onomatopoeia)
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Still been watching Pokemon everyday and starting to feel diminishing returns as I am almost too comfortable watching it. Maybe thats ok? I am not sure. But there is maybe one new phrase or word an episode. I am still keeping current with my other shows so its not like I am going completely unchallenged during the week. but still can’t help but wonder if this is ok to do.
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Listened to Teppi whilst driving to and from my parents. Ironically in one of the episodes he was warning about listening whilst driving.
Did more N5 drills in the afternoon, still getting the odd one where I’m completely stumped until I’ve listened a few times which unfortunately you don’t get to do in the test!
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Nov 14, Mon of Week 8 of Fall 2022 
I watched an episode of Pokemon on Netflix + VPN (Ep.2). It starts to feel unreasonable. Also, kids to climb a construction site???
I watched a video from Youtube playlist in the MOOC post – 【82歳のボディビルダー】現役引退の”決断” 老いと向き合う日々...鍛えつづけて50年、最後の舞台に密着 ～82-year-old bodybuilder in Japan【テレメンタリー】 - YouTube. Truthfully, I didn’t understand that much. However, there is Japanese transcript / sub to study later on.
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Day 45, 14th of November
Episode 8 of あかがみんクラフトclassic. Soon I will have to search for more subtitled gaming content…
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November 14th:
As I said I wanted to test some new resources this week.
Today I tried Tadoku.
Tadoku is a website that has free books with audio. When played (on level 0 and 1) a sound is played, when the page should be turned. With this I let the audio of the page play, before I turn to that page. On level 2 this does not happen anymore, so I let it run through and read it with the audio afterwards.
The first book I tried is for Level 0. The topic was rock-paper-scissors. This one was unsurprisingly very easy. The book is written horizontally and the pages turned left to right. One page is mostly a single line of text. The sound seems to be artificially slowed down, which does not sound nice.
The second book is on Level 1 and about a sentient big apple. There were two sentences I didn’t quite catch the first time and I didn’t know the word
At Level 2 the selection is pretty limited. There are total of 7 books with audio.
I listened to a book about a Brazilian folktale of the creation of a flower. I did understand the gist of it and could catch most of the sentences, but sometimes there was a sentence that I could not entirely follow. Reading through it afterwards, there weren’t any new words.
This book was also written vertically. The sentences were still quite short, but the words used are more difficult.
For all of them the audio was about 5min long. Up to at least Level 2 all of them have furigana (even for katakana).
I will stick with level 2 for a bit, before trying out if level 3 is too hard for me.
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November 14 
One episode of Paranoia Agent, one level of Migaku.
And, about an hour of audiobook (while reading along). This was a revelation. I’m sure it’s because it’s a rather simply written book, but I never expected to follow along so well. In fact, it seemed like I understood the audio faster, or rather more instinctively, than the text. I’m not sure I’m explaining it well. I’d listen, and would understand what I heard even when I lost my place in the book because of speech speed. Then I might pause and read the text more carefully, especially when I thought there was a word worth looking up, and it was like I was reading the sentence for the first time. Like the meaning from the audio was being processed in my head very differently than the written text. Such a strange sensation. I’m choosing to interpret it as a good thing. Apparently while I wasn’t looking, my listening has improved enough to work adequately on its own? Again, a simple enough book, but still an unexpected success for me.
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It’s fun, isn’t it? That’s what good intonation does for you (or well, at least for me). Sometimes it’s a bit dangerous for me because it feels like I’m gliding along and understanding everything, which sometimes is the case, but sometimes when I think back it turns out that I hadn’t understood all that much
By the way, which audiobook are you listening to?
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It’s 体育館の殺人 with the Mystery Club over at Natively. It was asking for audio, really, because the writing itself isn’t anything spectacular so far 
And yes, that’s what it felt like most of the time, gliding along. I couldn’t tell you what the words were in any individual phrase, but I understood the meaning nonetheless. Well, most of the time.
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Sounds like excellent progress! 
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November 14th!
I watched an episode of Mitsuboshi Colors today.
The stories in the episode were all ones I’ve previously read in the manga, so it was quite understandable. Unfortunately it had baked in english subtitles and they kept drawing my eye, so its hard to know how much I was properly understanding just by hearing it!
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I watched some random youtube videos and have started watching a R rated drama that I can not take seriously because one of the main guys I only know from comedy. I probably wouldn’t be able to take it seriously even without that, but it adds to the laughs.
Also, I remembered this audio drama series was a thing - @omk3 (heh I tag you so much, but you and @Daisoujou are the only folks I know consistently interested in darker content): 令和版・夜のミステリー by AudioMovie® オーディオムービー
I never listened to all the episodes but I do recall they did a good job of building dramatic tension.
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Finished the last drill section of the previously mentioned N5 book and then took the mock test. Did much better than expected and got 75%. I wasn’t comfortable at all (I struggle to process times, dates & numbers quickly enough) but muddled along.
Haven’t got any refresh content now for N5 so I guess revising on what I’ve already listened to.
It was raining yesterday so Teppi stayed home with a sulky dog who’s too posh to go out in the rain.
The pressure of a test and this listening challenge has definitely motivated me to keep practicing daily. I want to practice reading, I need to practice listening… “raise the floor not the ceiling” and all that.
Putting a little tick in the box, so motivating! thanks @omk3
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Nov 15, Tue of Week 8 of Fall 2022
I watched Ep.1 of ブラックジャックによろしく with generated sub. Watching with transcript sidebar can be done with a subtitle editor, only that no real editing is done, because of “it wastes time”. So, some real listening has to be done, and of course I knew the storyline beforehand from the manga.
Having 9:41 minutes of unchanging お疲れさ is probably the biggest hardship, and probably worth setting aside some time to fix.
I listened to an episode of Learn Japanese with Noriko on Podbean, on collaboration; and half episode of YUYUの日本語Podcast on Spotify, on Okinawa. Podbean now has mainly female senseis, while Spotify has males. I can’t be bothered to find new people (on Podbean) who I can’t listen to well enough.
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November 15
Today I reached level 50 of Migaku, and had two perfect scores in a row
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I also listened with the volume turned down for some of the time, and even when I couldn’t hear the words very well, I could still hear the pitch accent with good enough accuracy. I’m very impressed that the trainer could get me from “I don’t even understand what that is” to “yes, definitely heiban” so fast. It was well worth it.
I also watched episode 8 of Paranoia Agent - twice. I had commented how I didn’t remember some episodes at all, but this one I started remembering the moment I saw it. I still had to rewatch to catch all the details though. I have no words. It was heartbreaking and heartwarming, bittersweet, silly, absurd, surprising, creepy and dark, all at the same time.
And I listened to the first episode of this AudioMovie thing @pocketcat linked to (thanks for thinking of me and tagging me, your recommendations are always so interesting!). They did a strange thing with the audio direction, where you could sort of “sense” the space because people would speak closer to or further from the microphone, even from a different room, it sounded like, and there were full sound effects like rain and knocks etc. As the name says, audio movie. I felt almost like I was eavesdropping on the two girls. I didn’t catch everything (and certainly not much of what was said from the room next door), but I did follow the story. It did a good job with the heightening (and loosening) of the dramatic tension. As far as the plot goes it was nothing special, but it was nice, quality listening practice.
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Ha, same. I’m pretty sure numbers are encoded differently if you will, than other concepts in your brain. I’ve gotten better at it over time but I have to focus when lots of them are being thrown out because my brain just fuzzes them otherwise.
I’m glad you liked it! I agree it lives up to its name of Audio Movie. Reminds me of old radio shows almost with all the sound effects.
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Pocketcat,
Thanks for sharing the Japanese Sign Language Chart! I was just wondering the other day how the Japanese did that, or IF they used Sign Language. Now I know!
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