… We might have gone a bit crazy when we were making the schedule for 獄門島 (I for my part underestimated the long weeks) since it was just us and now it seems to have stuck. I don’t think we’ll keep it forever, and it’s open to change at any time to begin with. I don’t think anyone would mind a slower pace if it meant a chance for someone else to read along. 
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Day 8 - April 8
- 無職転生 ～異世界行ったら本気だす～ 1 - 1,73% → 11,78%
I was feeling a bit sick yesterday, so today I did a Covid test and it was positive 
So far it feels like a heavy flu so I’m going to relax a lot by myself for some time (since my fiancé is not positive, so even in our house I’m isolated 
)
I read some more of 無職転生 and I love the introduction to the story much better than in the anime! It gives more insight in what the MC did in his previous life and why he died. This was also depicted in the anime, but it feels like it glanced over the fact that he tried to save some people from a truck. The language used is perfect for my level of Japanese, so I feel like I can read a lot more of this than with 美少年探偵団, which is really poetical at times.
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Day 7 
Read: マグメル深海水族館
Finished: Chapter 3, Chapter 4
Time: 10 minutes, 18 minutes respectively
Finished the first volume of マグメル! I really like this manga so far, I’d definitely recommend it if the deep sea interests you. It got easier to read near the end because a lot of the specialized vocab from the beginning is repeated. The most difficult aspect was probably reading the names of the sea creatures since they’re almost always long katakana words, and some of them aren’t on jisho. I’m curious how things will go for Koutarou after this and what’s going on with all the things that are being hinted at, so I’ll definitely pick up the next volumes.
New Vocab
出張 （しゅっちょう）business trip; official trip
オウムガイ chambered nautilus (esp. species Nautilus pompilius)
偕老同穴 （かいろうどうけつ）happy life partnership; living faithfully together till death also
カイロウドウケツ Venus’s flower basket (Euplectella aspergillum)
仲睦まじい （なかむつまじい）harmonious; intimate
海綿 （かいめん）sponge
マッコウクジラ sperm whale
工夫 （くふう）device; design; idea; plan; invention
潜水服 （せんすいふく）diving suit
赤外線 （せきがいせん）infrared rays; infrared radiation
補助 （ほじょ）assistance; support; aid; help
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I am impressed by the pace that you both and @basilsauce have been going at while I’m meandering along getting distracted by cute gay manga 
The only problem is resisting clicking on all the fun spoiler chat until I catch up!
Speaking of cute gay manga…I finished vol 1 of ギヴン yesterday. It’s started to get more into what I remember as the emotional heart of the anime (spoiler warning, and content warning for reference to suicide) where one of the main characters is trying to process/cope with the assumed suicide of someone really important to him. But as well as emotions it also gave me a fun grammar lesson!
grammar via manga screenshots- たまえ
So I hadn’t come across the grammar ending たまえ yet so I looked up and the description was kind of like "it’s sort of ‘please/ください’ but also you pretty much only see it in media and it’s super bossy and sounds like you are talking down to an inferior’. And like, literally both times a character uses it in the screenshots below, we get 春樹はるき going 上司かよ in response 
Thanks 春樹, don’t think I’ll forget the usage of that one anytime soon!
I also read more 
, finishing up chapter 1 part 4. It was very funny, absolutely love the image of the guy climbing up the fire escape to presumably do something dastardly but then being like “aaah! I’m scared of heights, help!”
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Hope you have a speedy recovery! Relaxing sounds like the best plan. Enjoy some soup as well.
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Last night I read 14 pages of 三毛猫ホームズの推理. The cold I’ve been battling all week has taken over my sinuses and it’s oddly difficult to focus on reading when you can’t breathe through your nose. I finished out part 2 section 3 and stopped. This puts me at 41% read.
26 Likes
４月８日 - Day 8
Calendar
I didn’t post since Day 2, but I managed to read every day, mostly 博士の愛した数式 and I got to 27% of the book! I’m getting more and more attracted to the story and have to hold myself back from reading too much and neglecting responsibilities. 
Vocab
-
Math-related:
桁 - digit
掛ける - to multiply (ex.110掛ける2は220）
引く - to subtract (ex.10引く8は２）
分数 - fraction
友愛数 - amicable numbers
偶数 - even number <=> 奇数 - odd number -
Other:
レモンを絞る - to squeeze a lemon
知恵を絞る (I just noticed that I’d highlighted the phrase with the same verb
) - to rack one’s brain
恐れが潜んでいる - fear is lurking
初対面 - first meeting
On Day 5 I read an article on yahoo news: 4年のブランクを経てカムバックした「BIGBANG」、新曲「春夏秋冬」は人々に受け入れられるか？, from which I might add the vocab later.
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Tanuki Den (aka Homepost): Date 20220408 
Today is the day that Hachiko (ハチ公 - the goodest of good bois) is remembered in his hometown of 大子内「おおしない」, Oshinai.
The dog who waited for his master to return for nine whole years.
Such a good dog, he’s got a statue and everything, every time I remember about him I just cannot take it 
“天国へ行ったハチ公は、大好きな博士と一緒に暮らしているのですから。”
Japanese found in the tall grass
New Things
忠犬「ちゅうけん」ー Faithful dog
幼犬「こいぬ」ー Another way to write puppy: 子犬
博士「はかせ」ー Expert; Learned person; Doctor (the PhD kind). wait, I’ve heard this before! This is one of the few words I know from hearing it over reading it.
絆「きずな」ー Bond, as in, an emotional bond.
出来事「できごと」ー Event; incident; affair; happening
教授会「きょうじゅかい」ー Faculty meeting
脳溢血「のういっけつ」ー Cerebral haemorrhage/apoplexy
植木「うえき」ー Garden shrubs; trees; potted plant
職人「しょくにん」ー Craftsman; artisan
寄稿「きこう」ー Contribution (to a newspaper for example)
一躍「いちやく」ー Suddenly; instantly
国内外「こくないがい」ー Inside and outside the country; domestic and foreign
次第「しだい」ー Depending on [something]; relying on [something]
フィラリア ー Filaria (a parasitic disease)
慰霊祭「いれいさい」ー Memorial service
故~「こ」ー The late; the deceased. Used before someone’s name.
亡骸「なきがら」ー Remains (of a body)
剥製「はくせい」ー Taxidermy
Places
大子内「おおしない」ー Oshinai, Odate
大館「おおだて」ー Odate City, Akita Prefecture
浅草「あさくさ」ー Asakusa, Tokyo
代々木「よよぎ」ー Yoyogi, Shibuya
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Reading felt a bit more fun today. Still not through the current booklet, but I’ll get there. (Ask graded reader, level 4, volume 2)
I’m currently reading the second book in the Seashell Cove Paranormal Mystery series I talked about, Haunted Witch. Really enjoying this one and I don’t have as much time/energy to read as I wish, but it also means the book doesn’t end as fast despite not being long books.
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Day 8 - Calendar
Still reading 夜カフェ.
Today I read the rest of chapter 11 as well as 4 pages into chapter 12. At the moment it looks like I can finish the book on Sunday and start the new week with a new book. I’m looking forward to it.
Also I read a news article on my Nintendo Switch in Japanese. While I didn’t understood it fully (I was too lazy to look up the unknown kanji), I was able to get the gist of it.
Also I noticed that I’m slowly becoming better at reading katakana.
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Day 6 ご一報 
I read a good chunk of よつばと today, I’m halfway through the first book. It really does feel good when reading is not a total struggle.
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Day 8 
Candy and Cigarettes ~37 pages
As promised to myself, I took a break from 三毛猫ホームズの推理 today and read a manga instead. I discovered Candy and Cigarettes by accident when I was idly browsing Bookwalker’s freebies some weeks ago, and so far I’m liking it a lot. There’s something about an honest upstanding citizen turning bad in his old age that appeals to me. Ditto for a cute and innocent looking under-age assassin. Add to that a shady secret organization run from a second hand bookshop, and there’s really not much more I need in a story to be happy. It’s full of fun satisfying action but what mostly keeps my interest is the delicate dynamics in the relationship of the two protagonists.
Look at the cute little angel nodding off after a tiring day of shooting down corrupt politicians after school .
Some vocab
うまい話 – offer that’s too good to be true, likely scam
返り血 - spurt of blood that splashes you when you hurt/kill someone
殺人鬼 - bloodthirsty killer
寄生虫 - parasite
裏カジノ - unlicensed casino
おびき出す - to lure out
するい - cunning, sneaky
人の道 - moral way of life, correct path
殺戮 - slaughter, massacre
(I also read a little of 佐賀のがばいばあちゃん for the IBC)
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Just 6 pages for かがみの孤城 🪞 Week 20 today.
Nice word: 羽目 - awkward situation
Sounds interesting! Added it to the list 
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Day 8 / Calendar
Just finished reading this week’s beginner book club part. Around 50 minutes before the day rolls over in my timezone. It actually went quite well I think, barely had to pull out ichi.moe to break down sentences and didn’t need to use deepl to understand them, which was nice.
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April 8th
・薬屋のひとりごと (10% → 12%)
Finished chapter five. Thoughts/note to self: Maomao really didn’t want to attract attention but ended up getting promoted from low-ranking servant to the princess’s (?) maid 
Also was a bit surprised about this Jinshi person, seems like he could’ve been a model/idol with his pretty looks. Mysterious word of the day: 尚服, uniform of some sort??
Now (tomorrow) I can browse the week 2 thread, completely forgot to earlier today. Maybe people already talked about the part with the gates that I thought was confusing yesterday.
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April 8th!
I was hoping to do a lot of reading tonight, but its been a bit of a tough day and I’m a bit unwell so I didn’t.
I read the next chapter of Teasing Master Takagi-san though, which means I’ve finished Volume 5 
Finishing a volume always feels like an achievement.
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I read nine pages today and it is getting easier. I’ll start the fourth book in the set tomorrow.
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April 8
お疲れ！ We made it to Friday!
I read 4 of the level-one graded readers just now because I’m not sure when I’ll have time later. I got my friend hooked on Yuri on Ice, so we’ll be watching more of it later tonight. The readers were good! All food-related lol. I’m getting better at recognizing cooking-related words.
Someone in one of my discords posted a link to a short story on a site called Novel Updates. It’s kinda like AO3 where there’s filters and tags to sort info. One of the tags is works that were originally published somewhere else, like syosetsu. Which I find useful because it means I can try to look up the work on Syosetu and read it in Japanese!
Progress on Tadoku graded readers
44 / 44 level-zeros
4 / 12 level-ones
x /10 level-twos
x / 18 level-threes
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Day 8?
Started reading なぜ?どうして?かがくのお話1年生: 0% → 22%.
Read about yawning, forhead bumps and hematomas, stages of teeth growth, why we get a headache when eating cold stuff, why farts smell bad. There’re not many kanjis, but the text contains spaces, so it’s not so much a hiragana hell.
I’m trying out a new word processing routine: I add new words to a list on jisho when I look them up, and the export them as csv and append to my master list. Still not inputting them into SRS, as the idea of having to learn words with an SRS doesn’t appeal to me.
There was one simple sentence I’m not sure I understood, so I’d be grateful if anyone can clarify this for me. For context, the text is talking about wisdom teeth:
これは、生えてくる 人と 生えない 人が います。
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Oh no! Take care of yourself; I really hope you feel better soon.
Same goes for you. This club is starting to feel like a sickness magnet 
. お大事に!
Rather big Summer Pockets day! I did indeed finish Ao’s route quickly; I’ve been adding in a little extra reading at night and was less than 1000 characters away. It managed to really hit me at the end, so I have to say despite the grevances I’ve alluded to, I quite liked it.
Learning by reading like this, there’s really no way it can be approached but holistically, but do you all ever feel like you’re bouncing between certain parts of the language as what’s jumping out at you at the moment? In the past I mentioned struggles with onomatopoeia… recently it feels like it’s all compound verb time. I don’t necessarily mean I’m having trouble with them, they vary with a lot being very intuitive and some less so. I’m just really encountering a staggering amount of them recently to contend with in Anki and if my Japanese studies were characterized by anything right now, it’s sorting those out.
So now that I’m back choosing what I do each day, I can choose some of the silly side events I mentioned, and one was dealing with a beehive in an inconvenient spot. I got incredibly confused by the line “ハチの巣をハチの巣にしてくれませんか？” until I read on and the character said it was a 比喩 (metaphor/simile/etc) and some searching has taught me, if I read the Japanese answer correctly, that ハチの巣状態 and similar phrasings refer to how a beehive is full of holes. Interesting.
I’ve decided it’s time for Umi’s route. She’s the one non-romantic full route; a young girl who is the protagonist’s (IIRC) unspecified relative. Her scenes have always amused me and it’ll be nice to see what this game goes for when it’s not romance.
Following her also led me down a rabbit hole to an entire minigame tucked away behind inconspicuous side choices. Turns out, you can unlock a whole monster collecting and battling game, which gives you something to do each day when you’re not hanging out with someone as an alternative to the many side scenes. This game is loaded with optional content. It’s incredibly simplistic but I have to admit it looks addictive all the same. I spent a little too much time today acquiring bugs and fish and battling the low ranked opponents… which were mostly turtles, dogs, cats, anything but humans.
That map is kind of adorable. I only read about 5000 characters today, but a lot of that ended up being card game tutorial stuff, which got a little dense and used a weird font, so I don’t feel too bad.
I have too much to say today! Well to conclude, my favorite new word is 雄姿 (ゆうし), which intuitively means something along the lines of “magnificent appearance.” There’s a lot of meaning packed into that word.
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