Just a quick comment about this word, even though it does carry the meaning ‘suitable’, I believe it’s most commonly used to describe something that’s being done in a half-assed or shoddy manner.
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This week’s reading was dominated by Autumn Prison where I read the second story and started the third one. Eugenia is also going strong and very exciting to read as everything is very unclear and the reader is slowly being filled in by bits and pieces of information but I have no idea what belongs where and what is the truth.
Today’s sauna visit had me read The Little Prince, and this week I also started an English book, Nadine Gordimer’s “The Lying Days”. This is part of my “read every Literature Nobel prize winner (except the poets 
) and in the original language if possible” quest. And then I decided that I want to read another Flesh&Blood volume this year, and while I was thinking about that and where to fit it best, I started reading it 
Next week I want to finish Autumn Prison, and I want to continue the other three books (I don’t think I have time for the sauna so The Little Prince needs to wait some more 
)
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Back on that Book Boom baby, WOOO. Read 3 more chapters of Shield Hero and some of Is it Wrong to Pick up Girls in a Dungeon? I just couldn’t stop reading yesterday. I am hoping to finish Shield Hero volume 1 either tomorrow or the next day. Haven’t decided if I will go back to 青ブタ 9 afterwards. I really like the chapter structure of Shield Hero, especially on Audiobook since its easier to pick up where I left off. 青ブタ has like chapters and sub chapters, but the audiobook is divided by the chapters, so I have to either be at the start of a chapter or lucky T-T.
Anyways, I am happy I am back on the book train.
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Home
November 20
人間椅子 -
ジョジョの奇妙な冒険51
start - 110
This fight went differently from what I remembered. I might’ve tried to read fast to the end of the fight because there was a spider. Also, I just now noticed two members of Bruno’s team, Mista and Narancia, like to solve their problems by shooting them.
Next part is Pompeii! I’m seriously thinking of going to the exhibit this Wednesday since it’s a holiday. I’m thinking now of bringing 51 and 52 with me so I can take even more pics. I need to remember to bring my plushie holders too
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Yes, that’s one of the things I like about that series: things do not always work out in the end. Or at least not the way I was hoping for, I guess?
Same thing happened to me. I read like, one manga and 2% of a book.
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November 20th (Home Post Link)
Forgot to charge my kindle, so started reading a physical book. Figured now would be a good time to start 耳をすませば, since I’d finished Tae Kim, and I could get a real gauge on how difficult it would be while charging.
Read/Played:
- 耳をすませば pg 0 → 32 – GOD i love this. Some of the exchanges (especially first times names are used) would be a little difficult if I wasn’t familiar with the story already just because the paneling can get a little confusing, but almost no issues. Already some differences between book and movie, but relatively minor no カントリー・ロード my beloved
Some kanji don’t have furigana, but they’re the ones that are like super super common, so that wasn’t an issue.
Good Words
さっさと ー immediately, without delay
貸出「かしだし」ー lending (here 貸出カード)
県立「けんりつ」ー prefecture managed (here 県立図書館)
ソバカス ー freckles
真剣「しんけん」ー serious, earnest
白状「はくじょう」ー confession
球拾い「たまひろい」ー ball boy
葉書「はがき」ー postcard
印象「いんしょう」ー impression
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2022-11-21T01:46:00Z
I finished 神のみぞ知るセカイ １today. My Japanese reading comprehension has improved. Even without relying on my memory of the story, I could still follow what’s happening. I can recognise more words now.
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Home Post
11.20.2022
48→59
Completed this weeks reading, though I do want to go back and re-read some parts I misinterpreted.
14:17→16:55
I started making an anki deck for words I’ve looked up and even just going through 50 of the cards today helped a lot since they’re very specific to this game. Definitely going to keep doing that at least until I’ve beaten it. Reading also went a lot smoother today since there was a lot less to read in general now that I’m out of all the intro cutscenes.
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Day 50:
Priority: 
青桐.
Free choice: 
ミニスカ宇宙海賊 1.
Extra: 
のだめカンタービレ 6, and finished it. 
And finished another week! There are a lot of Xs so far in November, but I haven’t fully missed a day. 
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November 20 Home Post
More chaos today; I ended up picking up Pokemon Legends Arceus to chill with my partner while they played the new one. It’s a lot of fun so far! I’ve been meaning to play it for a while, it always seemed like my kind of thing, and I had access to it so why not 
It’s at a good reading level where I can really just hang out and play it and only look up an occasional thing when the mood strikes, so that felt good!
I also read a bit more ブルーロック until sleepiness came for me 
good times as always, but now it is time to sleep lmao
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Day 11 Progress:
お隣の天使様 二冊 - 73.44% → 80.64%
スローループ - Chapter 3
I’m not really enjoying 天使様. Actually, it’s driving me insane. Excuse me while I rant a little bit.
My primary reason for choosing it as a first read was that it’s a SOL/romance title and I enjoy those, plus I had heard great things about it being a fairly straightforward and pleasant series. On top of that, I figured it probably won’t have too many difficult or made-up fantasy words and insane kanji for me to deal with. In the early days I could only read a few lines or maybe 1% and was much more focused on the mechanics of reading than the story itself. Now, I can read a bit more comfortably than I used to so now I can properly get into the story… which would be great if I could actually get into it.
天使様 is just boring. Boring, and also pretty frustrating to read. The heroine,
The passage (with my own half-assed translation)
手入れして撫でて、まではよかったのだ。
To hear that Mahiru holds the stuffed bear (he gave her) and pets it, that much makes him happy.
ただそこから続いたのは、耳を疑うような可愛らしい行為だった。
However, she continued to speak and described doing something so cute he doubted his own ears.
抱き締めて一緒に寝る。
She held the bear when sleeping.
あの真昼が、くまのぬいぐるみを抱えて寝る。
That Mahiru, held the bear in her arms and went to sleep.
真昼の寝顔を見た事があるが、まさに天使のような寝顔だった。
Amane has seen Mahiru’s sleeping face and it was truly an angelic expression.
あの寝顔で、ぬいぐるみを愛おしそうに抱き締めて寝ている。美少女が、くまのぬいぐるみと一緒に寝る。
With that expression, she held the bear tenderly and slept. She was a beautiful woman but she slept together with the bear.
想像すると、ものすごく可愛らしく眺めていたくなるような光景が
When he imagined it, an adorable scene that he desperately wanted to see unfolded in his mind and his face turned red.
Imagine that sentiment being cycled over and over again, ad nauseam, over the last two volumes.
If I were fluent in Japanese, this probably wouldn’t annoy me as much as it does, but unfortunately it takes me probably four times longer than with English to get through a Japanese sentence even when I’m reading smoothly. And my irritation definitely builds up the longer it takes me to read.
Will I take my own advice, read only what I enjoy reading, and give up? Probably not, I’m a stubborn (and dumb) motherfucker who wants to see the first series they ever started in Japanese through to the end. Plus, the novels have actually been a great help for my learning, including (rather bizarrely, I feel) quite a few literary grammar points as well as showing more conversational Japanese writing when 周 and his friends talk like the high schoolers they are. So there’s been plenty of learning at the very least, even if I do take some considerable mental damage every time I see him talk about 真昼’s 可憐さ and her 美貌…
Word of the Day: 猫を被る - to feign friendliness; to play the hypocrite. Kind of a contrarian phrase to me considering how standoffish and honest to their own desires cats really are…
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Ah! You’re right, it’s よ, reading sure would be easier if I could read. I spent way to long trying to find なも as well because I kept reading it as なま.
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Ok, my mental health was not at best recently, so, unfortunately, I didn’t do much reading. I did read a bit, but forgot to take a note of it, so I’m not sure which days it was.
So, for simplicity, it would be best to say that from November the 8th till November the 17th I haven’t read anything at all.
On November 18th – November 20th I caught up with NHK Easy News.
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Didn’t post yesterday - partly due to a particularly poor effort. But I was at work for a lot of the day.
Today was better. I didn’t have as much time to read as I’d like, but made progress.
20/11 1 page Spy Family
21/11 18 pages Spy Family ( to end mission), 7 pages God Bless the Mistaken
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Nov 21, Mon of Week 9 of Fall 2022
- Death Note Vol.5 Ch.39
Try reading without look up, while inferring from Kanji and Kana; but it felt too long. Also, I somewhat have lost interest in the case (just like L some chapters ago). Furigana is very helpful, because at least I won’t blank out. (I might remember Kanji meaning, but not the reading.)
And indeed, I can’t highlight manga on Bookwalker.
- うたわれるもの (Steam) 1 hour
I killed MC in a fight, but I believe he will be revived for the next fight.
Interesting vocabularies
- ワイロ written on top 献金 (けんきん). I don’t realize the Kanji form until I look up, but わい gives some naughty and bad feelings; it’s actually 賄賂.
- First Kanji is seen often throughout the same material of the same chapter (always read わい). Verb / Kun form not seen within the chapter (賄う (まかなう)).
- さする written in Hiragana. Kanji form of 摩る, 擦る has many readings.
- 謙虚 void is modest
- 不条理 perhaps like 不合理
- 呻き声 confused with 呷る from yesterday. Of course no Furigana (うめきごえ).
- 瓶 [かめ] apparent 花瓶 or such has a Kun reading, like 亀, but with different pitch. 大瓶 [おおがめ] in context.
- 詮無い first Kanji is from 所詮
- 丹念 rust-tanned colored mind is of hard work.
- 手練れ mastery of training (訓練), and is sufficient (足りる). Has an alternate writing as 手足れ.
- 軟膏 Kanji is from bandaid (絆創膏), meaning greasey fat
- 由緒 therefore we are there together = lineage.
- 金づる full Kanji form is 金蔓. Well, money vine (蔓).
- うだうだ on and on
- 手厚い the 厚い part has a second meaning of being warm
- 寸法 measurable plan
Phrases
- 余裕綽々 [よゆうしゃくしゃく] longer version of 余裕
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20221121 - 吾輩は狸である progress: 79.38% 
Master’s niece visits the house so that can only mean one thing: big conversation time.
(and this one looks like a huge conversation)
Japanese found under the leaves
Meowords
放任主義「ほうにんしゅぎ」ー Principle of laissez-faire
猪口才「ちょこざい」ー Impudent; impertinent
踵 「かかと」ー Heel
蝙蝠傘「こうもりがさ」ー (Western Style) umbrella
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November 21st (Home Post Link)
Been doing some more linguistics literature review, and found this nice study: Unknown vocabulary density and reading comprehension (Hu & Nation, 2000) (should be open access) which I think is where the experimental evidence for the “98% vocabulary knowledge for comfortable unassisted reading with adequate comprehension” number comes from. It also has a nice overview section (it’s MA thesis work, so this is expected). If you’re interested in that relationship, this is a really nice standalone paper. Importantly, they were only looking at purely written text with absolutely no assistance. With the context of visual info (images, movies), or with the use of a dictionary, this number probably goes down to an extent.
Read/Played:
- 耳をすませば pg 32 → 70 – it feels pretty good that a lot of the words i’m looking up are in the N3 or N2 word lists (at least as labelled on jisho), and it’s pretty rare that i’m running into words below that. So I’m mostly needing to look up words around the level I’m currently studying at, which definitely gives me some confidence.
Good Words
連れて行く「つれていく」ー to take someone (to a place)
奥「おく」ー inside part
不思議 「ふしぎ」ー wonderful, marvelous
敏感「びんかん」ー susceptible, sensitive
ヤナヤツ = いやなやつ ー something like “unpleasant guy.” this was DRIVING ME CRAZY. thank you @MissDagger for already having this question and an answer in the book club lmao
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November 26 
体育館の殺人, 26-37%
I read this week’s portion of the Mystery Club book along with the audiobook. I’m continuing to not be impressed, but the audio helps a lot. Not sure whether it’s because it’s for a younger audience (it’s not officially a light novel though), or that it’s supposed to be a honkaku mystery, which means it is based on cold, clinical logic more than human passion. Humans are very illogical beings in my opinion, especially when committing crimes - but not in books like this.
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November 21st
Home post
Card Captor Sakura volume 1 or Aria: the masterpiece volume 2 – progress report
Yesterday: finished volume 1 of Aria: the masterpiece
Today: started with volume 1 of Card Captor Sakura. Read up to page 17(?).
I have started reading the 1st volume of Card Captor Sakura today.
The beginning where Sakura used magic was fortunately manageable. I may indirectly credit this to me having played JRPG’s with Japanese voice options with magic using or summoner characters and having encountered such words beforehand – thanks video games! 
The introductory scenes to Sakura’s daily life have also been comprehensible which is probably due to the vague memory of most parts of the series that I still have.
So far, so good! I may eat my words in the future chapters, though. 
It was also satisfying to come across a few words I (re-)learned through Wanikani,
such as 科目, 小学生, 追う and 風.
Lastly, the page numbers I write down for my daily progress may not always be correct for this series because I’ll probably miscount the page number I stopped at since the volumes use them sporadically.
Word or expression of the day:
遅刻 (ちこく) - lateness, late coming
Honourable mention:
命じる - (めいじる) - to order, to command
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Day 52, 21st of November
More Kiki. I might manage to get through the first chapter at the end of this challenge! After that things will go much faster because I won’t transcribe everything. I mainly did this for the first chapter because it lets me take notes on any grammar points I find so I can refer back to them later.
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