I believe I had the context of 「笊碁 (ざるご) 」の略。 Somehow this meaning is missing in JMdict and Wiktionary.
It can also be loopholes or poor skills as well, I think.
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I’d like to join this challenge but my reading ability is VERY limited. Can someone recommend a first-grade (or even younger) book or two to start with? Thanks.
Henry Bortman
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I don’t know if they are any good, but tadoku has some free grades readers that you can give a try.
Edit: Satori Reader is great also, since you can click on the vocabs you don’t know for the translation. They have some easier stories too and you can adjust kanji (and/or furigana) to your WaniKani level. It’s subscription based though…
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Ah yes, it has also the (familiar) meaning of letting a lot of things through. I’ve heard it in the context of a goalkeeper and a proofreading editor. It’s interesting that it became its own word for 囲碁.
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NHK easy news is also generally recommended. Graded Reader Level 0 should also be a good place to start. Satori should also have a nice choice of stories.
There are various apps and websites for Japanese native younger children (usually very simple picture books), but they aren’t necessarily that easy.
Another place I read before was, well, Tobira textbook.
Have you looked at The Ultimate Additional Japanese Resources List! ?
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Read 38 page of 三毛猫ホームズの推理 last night. This puts me at part 2, end of section 1.
Incredibly mild spoilers for part 1
I am firmly Team Cranes are 可愛いやつ. I love watching the machinery for putting up and taking down buildings, though, it’s so relaxing. Guess I can relate to the crazy old dude.
I am also, like @omk3 enjoying how the cat becomes the focal point every time things start to get steamy
I was also giggling at 片山’s reaction to
光枝 forgetting the height of one of her proposed girls and saying “oh, 1 meter something”.
一メートルと、なんて当たり前じゃないか。二メートルもあったら大変だ。
There is indeed a big plot development at the end of part 1 which results in a few new characters being introduced. I will avoid listing relationships to prevent spoilers, but here are the name readings for the list:
今井広三ーいまい こうぞう
石垣ーいしがき
Also, for the cute fans in the room, I realized you might enjoy the bookmark(s) I use for paperbacks that don’t have a marker string bound with them:
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Day 5 
Read: ジャックジャンヌー夏劇ー
Finished: 3 pages
Time: 12 minutes
Read to the next break in the first story. Looks like this short story is split into five parts and I’ve finished the first one, I want to try and read one each time I read this one from now on.
New Vocab
滲む to show through (of feelings, emotions, etc.); to reveal itself
霞む to become misty; to become hazy
起用 appointment (to a position, job, etc.); being used for a role; promotion
采配 order; command; direction
不評 bad reputation; disgrace; unpopularity
屈託 worry; care; concern
和らげる to soften; to moderate; to relieve
濁る to become muddy; to become cloudy; to get impure (of a liquid, gas, etc.)
憂愁 melancholy; gloom; grief
歌唱 song; singing
Read: 終遠のヴィルシュ -Error:salvation-
Finished: Chapter 3, Part 18
Time: 23 minutes
Picking this game back up after a couple months and so far it feels a lot easier to read than it did back then. Only have four endings left but since its been a while I’m going back and replaying the parts of the route leading up to them. With this game I can’t really say anything without it becoming a huge spoiler so I won’t say anything more in depth about this one, but hoping to finish it by the end of the challenge.
New Vocab
This one likes using kanji for things that are usually kana.
漂流者 person adrift on the sea; castaway (on an island)
手口 modus operandi; criminal technique; trick
蹲る to crouch; to squat; to cower
悍ましい disgusting; repulsive
下る to descend; to go down; to come down
経過 progress; development; course (of events)
比喩 simile; metaphor; allegory; parable
出来損ない good-for-nothing; worthless person; flop
掻っ切る to cut; to slit; to slash
豹変 sudden change; complete change
貧弱 poor; meagre; meager; feeble; scanty; shabby; insubstantial
暗所恐怖症 nyctophobia; fear of the dark; scotophobia
以て on (a day, date); at (a time); as of (e.g. today)
殉じる to sacrifice oneself; to die a martyr
継ぎ接ぎ cobbling together (other people’s writings, thoughts, etc.); gathering
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Added the names, thanks!
And apparently I had paused reading right before this big plot development! 
Ok, to be honest, I fully expected it, because how else would Katayama team up with Holmes for so many more books, I just thought it would happen towards the end of the book.
This is so adorable I almost want to start reading paper books again! Wait, I do still use some paper books, surely I could just justify getting one (or several)? Where can I get one? 
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6th of April
Day 6
So… I only read four pages over the last five days of not posting here, and some of those days I didn’t read at all.
I think I’ll start the challenge for real when I return from this trip. Actually I’m focusing on enjoying myself as well as getting lots of footage so I can compile all the videos into one summary video. My recent obsession 
I’ll try harder to get some reading done during travel times though, instead of being lazy. One page per day at least.
Completely failing on finishing 銭天堂 quickly here 
maybe I should set a goal of finishing it before I get back, as a means of motivating myself.
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Yes, I love paper books! I actually couldn’t get into reading in Japanese until I bought some paperbacks - something about settling down on the couch with a physical book, even if I need my phone or computer nearby for lookups, is so much more relaxing for me.
Also I bought them here! It looks like they discontinued some of the ones I have, but introduced new, equally adorable designs. 
Same! I also thought maybe 森崎 would be involved in the plot and end up arrested.
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Wouldn’t it be a more emphatic way of saying 始めから? In onomatopoeic words adding the small っ has that effect, at least, but I think it applies to all words…
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I suppose I am not good at grammar explanations, to me it ‘feels’ casual in that it’s kind of a slurred way of speaking. I don’t do all that much formal grammar study and so a lot ends up “well it feels X way” and then I have to google for sources to back up my gut
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Day 5 & Day 6 - Calendar
Totally forgot posting yesterday.
Anyways, finished chapter 8 of 夜カフェ yesterday and today I went trough chapter 9 as well as giving chapter 10 a very quick read. I have to reread chapter 10 though. Maybe I’ll do a little more this evening after dinner.
Somehow I finally managed to remember 頷く. Don’t judge, I’m just super slow with building up vocabs
But, I noticed that my reading speed and the pages I’m able to read without getting tired increased a lot since the beginning of the year. While reading ふしぎ駄菓子屋 銭天堂 (in February, I think) I managed to get trough 2 to 4 pages per hour, now I’m already at 8 to 10. So I’m happy about this.
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Instinctively I feel like both of those things are true; it definitely feels emphatic to me, but I also don’t feel like it would be as likely in a more formal context, it’d be like… too much? I’m also just going off of vibes mostly but yeah, that’s the sense I get 
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Tanuki Den (aka Homepost): Date 20220406 
Tanuki Scroll VI: キツネの仕返し 
Read today’s folktale, about a mountain priest who plays a mean trick on a napping fox. The fox gets its revenge by tricking the priest with an illusion.
コンコン！
Japanese found in the tall grass
New Things
山伏「やまぶし」ー A practitioner of Shugendo「修験道」- which is: “Japanese mountain asceticism incorporating Shinto and Buddhist concepts”
草むら「くさむら」ー Grassy place (especially long, thick grass). Can also be written like: 叢 or 草叢.
屏風「びょうぶ」ー Folding screen
ガタガタ ー Rattling; clattering
近寄る「ちかよる」ー To get close; to approach; to draw near
Does this even count?
ブオーッ！ ー How to say “BOO” in Japanese 
New Uses
一足「ひとあし」ー Thought this just meant “a step”, but here it’s used like: 一足遅く, meaning “a little late”.
Forgotten Things
Meanings
脅かす「おどかす」ー To threaten; to intimidate
愉快「ゆかい」ー Pleasant; delightful; enjoyable
(both of these were only in hiragana in the story, it’s a lot harder to recognise words without the kanji)
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I think an update is in order. I finished reading Yuru Camp vol 1 yesterday and I’m progressing well with Yoru Cafe, surprisingly well with 5 chapters read. Before bed I would read a chapter of Yoru Cafe, they’re not that big and I know most of the words. I try to read naturally without looking up anything during my read. Do I get everything, most certainly not, but I can look it up outside reading. I’m going through the vocab with koohi cafe. I have not generated all the cards yet there, still I’m over 75% of known vocab already. I think the key difference between books and manga is just the sheer range of different vocab, even if the word is only used once. You see lots of onomatopoeic words I added in my vocab list.
With Yuru Camp it’s kinda like same old. Published in seinen magazine, so expect kanji and very little furigana. I have seen it in names. So there I am looking up quite a few words or unfamiliar kanji. First that took a bit of time to get familiar with, then it balances out and becomes more comfy. I have camped regularly with my parents the last decade or so, but that’s always close by and with a caravan. Also with better weather. Still there is some beauty in it and I’ve become interested in the areas they visit in the manga. So I google mapped it to make sense of the scale and relative distances. They’re pretty close to Mt. Fuji after all.
I took quite a bit of pictures of it while reading, take a look in the details above. Of the main characters so far I guess I’m a fan of Rin (the dango bun girl) and Aoi (doggy girl). It’s been a pleasant read near the end of the volume and I think I’ll grab the next volume on kindle and read the continuation of the current trip they have.
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Yesterday, I only read like two pages of the current booklet in my graded reader volume, was planing to do more in the evening but watched TV with family instead. Today I read more, the current volume is the second non-fiction booklet of volume 2, level 4, this is unusual because all other volumes that I can remember only had one non-fiction one.
This one is called 東京を歩こう！and talks about Tokyo, surprise! The start of it had some intro and then some historical facts about how Tokyo became the capital and such. So most of the interesting words were the Japanese words for some historical events/policies I only knew the English word for before.
Historical terms!
征夷大将軍 = Shogun, or as my dictionary said: commander-in-chief of the expeditionary force against the barbarians
幕府 = Shogunate
藩 = feudal domain (Edo and early Meiji)
参勤交代 = Daimyos alternating Edo residence (one year at home, and one year in Edo/Tokyo)
鎖国 = national isolation / policy of national isolation enacted by the Tokugawa shogunate
My regular (English) reading have been nice. The first three days I did it (2-4th), I read a novel, maybe more short novel range. Stayed up a bit late on the last day of that to finish it. Yesterday I read a short story in the same series and in a bit I will start the second novel in the series. Seashell Cove Paranormal Mystery series by T. Thorn Coyle, can recommend. Very nice cozy mysteries so far.
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Read chapters 37 and 38 (34 pages) of ヨコハマ買い出し紀行 🛵 Volume 5. These were pretty wordy chapters (which I like) featuring some of the more technical aspects of the world that the story takes place in. Enjoyed it 
. Also learned what the 黒潮 is.
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Home post
\huge\color{ #FFDE72}\mathrm{🌼Day 6🌼}
\huge\color{ #FFDE72}\mathrm{🌼Day 6🌼}
\small \color{ #C9FF72}\mathrm{★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★}
Today I translated 1 page of よつばと！I’m impatient to read more and faster but between uni and SRS I’m often pretty head-empty when I finally have time to read Japanese:/
\small \color{ #C9FF72}\mathrm{★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★}
Tooltip
The flowers above the “Day #” links to my post for the previous day, and the flowers below link to the next day, except for the latest day ofc, they link somewhere special 
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Day 4 
tiny update
Today I read a chunk of デスノート second chapter. People working at Interpol screaming at each other still is a harsh read for me, tomorrow I definitely will switch to something lighter (get it? light-er just like Yagami’s name, proceeds to nervous laughter)
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