Thank you! My to read next list have now been reshuffled. We’ll see exactly what takes the top spot in a couple of weeks, but I believe I know what my next novel will be, even if it isn’t the next thing I pick to read. 
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Home post 
Aug 15th 
・ 本好きの下剋上 10 (24% → 27%)
As always, very curious how much reading I’ll have time for now that classes are starting up again. But I worry not - many sand can make big hill 
Already experienced that from previous challenges.
oh! btw, Bookwalker’s evil scheme is getting the better of me. cc @Naphthalene I bought Honzuki 30 just to fulfill requirement of “you must buy New BookTM to rank up”. Who knows when I’ll be able to read Honzuki 30??? 
That’s so far into the future, I’m like… whelp owo. Pretty much guaranteed to be a special moment when I get there.
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Today went back to the beginning of よつば& Vol 2 and reread p. 3-15, this time with help from reference material.
Also met with a classmate to give her my spare copies of Vol 1 + 2 (I bought a full set, so have duplicates); our class is online, so this was our first time meeting face-to-face after a year of classes together; it was nice to sit and chat! She is intrigued by my experiences with WaniKani, especially the discussion forum, so is going to check it out; she also gave me some recommendations for anime to watch. So even though work and home responsibilities are ramping up, it felt like a productive day on the Japanese study front.
Some new things:
写生 (しゃせい): sketching, drawing from nature
ゴリゴリ: with a scraping sound
殺人 (さつじん): murder
事件 (じけん): incident
殺人事件 (さつじんじけん): murder case
賛成 (さんせい): approval, agreement
用意 (ようい): preparation
スイスイ: lightly and smoothly (movement)
滑る (すべる): to slide, to glide
何もんだお前 (なにもんだおまえ): who/what the hell are you?!
裏 (うら): bottom
コロコロ: lightly rolling (of something small)
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August 15th:
Quick update before I sleep. 35 pages of 好きっていいなよ volume 2. I’m tired so I’ll look at everyone else’s posts later. Have a great day/evening/night!
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August 15th!
I started Volume 2 of Orange today. Really enjoyed the first chapter, even though I had to look up quite a lot of vocab. The story is really interesting and I’m looking forward to seeing what happens.
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August 15th
What did I read?: 今日のさんぽんた Vol 1
How much did I read?: 8 pages
How long did it take me?: 12 min
Blergh, I’m in a terrible mood today. Everything is irritating and dumb lmao
Just a tiny read today. But it feels like a victory because I’m tired and I want nothing more than to curl up in a blanket and forget the world exists.
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Also there are some very fun scenes in that book, so it will be doubly special!
I really want to geek about it too, but I will refrain myself until someone gets there.
In other news, I almost finished わたしの幸せ結婚 (around 80% now).
The end of 甘水 was very anticlimactic but whatever. I loved the part from 一志’s point of view showing how amazing 美世 has become. Other than that, I thought that 新 would be a double agent at then end of volume 4, but then volumes 5 and 6 did a good job convincing me that maybe, no, he is a traitor for real. And then he wasn’t. That was fun.
Now, where’s my marriage at?!? (in the last 20%, I guess)
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| REDC | 月 | 火 | 水 | 木 | 金 | 土 | 日 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week 8 |
８月１５日
Final Fantasy XIV
Quick update mode, engage! Started the main story questline and did several side quests just running around in the city I started at.
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Home
ジョジョの奇妙な冒険25
38 - 117
Whoo, more normal numbers!
F MEGA finished spectacularly and now it’s time for THATS A BASEBALL
Featuring an interesting panel.
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I really struggled to get into Tugumi. I’m still finding it hard, but have started to make headway. To me, the fact that my local library, in a very remote area, stocked the book meant that I should try my hardest to read it!
Yoru Café was difficult in a different way, though I’m finding the second book easier.
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A/C got fixed! Though I still read way less than I’d hoped today, because I ended up spending a lot of time scrolling through tumblr. Also waiting for an email from the library to say that the book I’d put on hold, which was checked out and due back today, was now available, but it never came. So either the person never returned it or it takes a while for a book to be checked in. And since I’m a ND with “can’t get anything done while in standby mode” disease, I ended up. not really reading. Or doing much else. Fun.
I read ch 25-26 of HQ, finishing vol 3 and starting vol 4.
I’ve finally learned Kenma’s name! I think his is one of the few I had zero idea of how it was spelled in kanji. And it’s こづめ, not こずめ, like I’d been thinking from the romanizaton. 孤爪, lone claw. Though I originally thought it was “fox” because I only remember the general shape and not the specific radicals lol
Some vocab of note:
幾度となく (いくどとなく) [adverb] on countless occasions; many a time
むさ苦しい (むさくるしい) [い-adj.] filthy; squalid; dirty; foul; sordid
四面楚歌 (しめんそか) [四字熟語, noun, の-adj.] being surrounded by enemies on all sides; being betrayed/forsaken by everybody
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August 15 
Home Post
Alright バディミッションBOND’s done for real this time! Which feels pretty wild honestly, it was a long one, almost exactly two months. I’m gonna miss them :') But seriously it was an absolutely fantastic experience, I can’t recommend it enough for anyone who enjoys like Ace Attorney or AI type mystery VN stuff (or like Zero Escape or Danganronpa honestly, it feels like it was made by people who like all of those lmao)! It’s honestly probably my favorite that I’ve played so far, all the characters are so fun and varied and complex, and there are so many interesting dynamics, and then all the absolutely wild plot stuff happening around all of it, it’s really an amazing game! I knew nothing going in so I really didn’t expect to love it nearly as much as I do, but I’m so glad I happened to get it when I did 
plus the bonus that I never could’ve experienced it without learning Japanese! Feels good 
the buddy bond rambling finale!
Where to begin honestly… so they successfully snuck onto the manmade island where エドワード’s plan to mind control the whole island was centered, and naturally there was a whole struggle that ended with アーロン whistling to get ルーク to sit and duck out of the way so he could leap in and attack Can’t believe they brought that goof in at like the most tense moment lmao, very on brand. So they successfully stopped the machine and エドワード, having lost, hit self-destruct on the island and commit suicide basically which… there are a lot of complicated feelings there, especially with ルーク trying to save him and all.
So yeah they stop the plan and yay all is good kinda!! In the main ending and all the other side stories there are lots of peeks into the future; ルーク goes back to リカルド to be a police officer again and fix their whole situation, アーロン lives with him for a bit (and man that’s chaotic) while アラナ recovers and then goes back to ハスマリー to try to stop the constant war and everything, and モクマ and チェズレイ stay together and basically go full vigilante, it’s really good. チェズレイ has his organization that he’s starting up again, but also he and モクマ are out here hypnotizing criminals into giving recorded confessions, incredible I like them a lot, have some pictures to prove it:
This is after チェズレイ asked モクマ to come along with him, and they were talking about how their promise is good for the rest of their lives and モクマ has to be by his side to make sure he’s sticking to it, and also how チェズレイ regretted not doing the pinky-promise last time so now he’ll do it directly even though モクマ’s covered in blood and dirt and stuff from their mission, and yeah it’s all very nice :') チェズレイ cares!! About ルーク too, he sent him a whole care package filled with vegetables like “I know you’re not eating, go to bed” But yeah anyway they’re just like this:
モクマ did a cute little play on his ninja slogan too:
Lastly please look at them having just the best time with ナデシコ, it’s very cute:
So yes all of this happened after the main ending and it said the main story was complete, everything’s resolved, but last-minute ルーク throws in this thing about remembering there being a baby at the lab as well? And there’s this mysterious new side-story category and going into it, it talks about how カエン didn’t actually kill アッカルド and イズミ’s son; he sent him on a boat to ハスマリー with a piece of the meteor as a protection charm. So this baby showed up and the researchers ended up with him and therefore the meteor necessary for their research, but then the lab was attacked and the baby got picked up by the army and raised as a military weapon, always believing that his parents just discarded him because he wasn’t good enough, but wanting more than anything to connect with them, to connect with anyone really. Then エドワード found him, adding him to the list of people エドワード’s a weird messed up father figure for, and so he came to support エドワード’s plan in the hopes of finally connecting with people, and ended up working with イアン, and… yeah, that’s right. The long-presumed dead son of アッカルド and イズミ… is シキ. 
And even more than that? The whole thing of シキ sacrificing himself when マイカ was destroyed? Nope, he just wanted to fake his death so he could go back to the plan more directly, he’d always been part of it. Really wild, by that point any hope I had for them bringing シキ back was gone, so all that happening after I thought the main story was done!! So yeah all that unlocks an alternate ending where you go confront シキ and show him that his parents never stopped loving him, and it’s so bittersweet, like by the time this is happening his parents are long dead, just… ouch. Look at him :
But also look at シキ badass mode, love to see it:
But yeah you convince シキ and shut down all the power that way, which also prevents エドワード from blowing up the island, allowing ルーク to talk to him and stop him from jumping off:
And thus begins エドワード being a really tragic character actually? Like I always found it hard to see him as straight-up evil just thinking of all his time with ルーク, even if he had ulterior motives he still raised him for years and genuinely saved him from being a broken, lonely kid. But going into his backstory, he was also discarded as a baby (real theme here huh) and picked up by an intelligence agency that raised him as a weapon and intelligence tool. Even as a tiny kid he was thrown into battle and had a high enough body count he lost track which just… oof. And he remained a spy for that country for like 30 years until he got exposed in ハスマリー and his agency completely abandoned him, and suddenly his whole existence and purpose and everything he’d known was gone and he was just in a war-torn country getting tortured for no reason. But then he happened upon the research and:
He really just wanted to feel something, to be connected to people for once in his life, and that seemed like the only way. So yeah, obviously he did a lot of awful things, that’s a given, but even in his plan he didn’t actively want to put people in aggro mode, he was just as happy to instill peace in everyone’s brain, that just… also has problems. But yeah ルーク hears all of this from him, as well as how the only sort of emotion he felt was when he was hypnotizing ルーク and he’d say 父さん all small and suddenly エドワード wouldn’t be able to continue, and ルーク’s just a bawling mess which yeah me too dude. But he gets the opportunity to heal, and シキ gets to spend time with his sister and the rest of their wild family situation, and I’m really glad they didn’t leave things the way they were in the first ending :')
Anyway I could talk about バディミッションBOND forever probably, I really love it a lot and I have so many feelings about it (obviously lmao) but I think that’s the gist of it. If there’s anything you wanna know about that I didn’t mention just let me know! It really was quite the journey; they’ll all live on in my heart for sure :')
Oof that aside, I also read a chapter of 海辺のカフカ today! Just one more left 
Then I tried reading 十角館の殺人 but it’s definitely not smooth sailing yet, I only read a couple pages before my brain gave up It should get better soon though!
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Day 46: August 15th 
Little bit of extra reading today to make up for not getting a lot in over the weekend.
ふだつきのキョーコちゃん Volume 7 (39% ➨ 58%)
くノ一ツバキの胸の内 Volume 4 (34% ➨ 51%)
🔍 名探偵コナン Volume 11 (42% ➨ 52%)
After the last Conan story that was filled to the brim with dialogue that took me forever to go through, it’s nice to have a case where I have only a couple of vocabulary look-ups per page, and a whole chapter is over before I realize it.
👧 からかい上手の(元)高木さん Volume 5 (56% ➨ 63%)
There’s a potentially familiar face in today’s reading:
Looks like it’s potentially this girl grown-up (although she’s a few years younger than Takagi):
Could just be a coincidence, though.
🪄 まじっく快斗 Volume 1 (49% ➨ 66%)
Even though Kaitou Kid appears eventually appears in Detective Conan, I wasn’t expecting to see anything in this series that later appears in the latter.
And yet:
The main difference comparing the two is that this Tropical Land has a Dragon Coaster, whereas Detective Conan has the Mystery Coaster.
Kaito Kid:
Detective Conan:
I’m under the impression the two stories take place in different cities, so maybe there are at least two Tropical Lands?
The mangaka’s habit of having female characters wear their watch with the face on the inside of their wrist was in place here, as well:
Random female character from today’s Detective Conan reading:
I wonder if it was common for girls/women in Japan to wear their watch that way back then.
藤代さん系。 Volume 2 (26% ➨ 51%)
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August Week 1-15th 
So far in August I’ve read Flesh & Blood 2 and finally finished 夜は不思議などうぶつえん。Since then I’ve been reading a bit of 悪食令嬢と狂血公爵 ~その魔物、私が美味しくいただきます!~ every day, I’m about halfway through now. I’m finding the relationship development so far really sweet and reading the cooking part made me really hungry. The biggest difficulty I’m having with it so far is sometimes I’m not sure how to read some of the more fantasy words that don’t show up in a dictionary.
Today I decided to drive a bit far to Kinokuniya and a Book-off not far from there. The Kinokuniya was really small and didn’t have much but this particular Book-off location’s selection was mostly Japanese and they had quite a lot of games too. When I checked out the cashier spoke to me in Japanese so I even got some impromptu speaking practice (although I panicked and barely said anything other than はい 
)
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August 15
(home post)
Orange page 5 → 23 (18 pages)
It’s funny because I felt like I only read like 5 pages. But I guess it was 18. ^^
So yeah, I started chapter 5 of Orange yesterday. I’d read a bit more later (I read fairly early) but I got wrapped up in other things.
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August 13
I was wrong all along! I had gotten it into my head that each route of バリバリ had 4 levels, each getting longer and longer, and by now had started to think that I would never finish this game, but it turns out they only have 3 levels! So today I played for a bit over 2h of バリバリ and found myself unexpectedly having finished my first route of it! Now the game doesn’t seem so dauntingly long anymore. Maybe I can even finish a second route this month.
I also read a chapter of 青のフラッグ with which I finished Volume 3! And then read some ビブリア (32% → 35%)
August 14
Started a new バリバリ route and played for 30 minutes. Read 3 chapters of 青のフラッグ.
August 15
Mostly focused on reading ビブリア (35% → 42%), but also read 1 chapter of 青のフラッグ.
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Reading is going quite well last 24 hours.
After I posted last night I ended up finishing シャドーハウス volume 1 as I couldn’t get to sleep.
Today I’ve started reading book 1 of Orange - I’d been considering reading this with the book club but didn’t have time, and I haven’t been sure if it was something I’d be interested in. I’ve reached p47 today after work so not bad going. Will see how I go.
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Read over 100 pages of D.N. Angel and accidentally finished volume 1 / started volume 2 nearly at once. Also just had some time to finish chapter 1 of Tugumi while everyone is sleeping, so in addition to catching up on my reviews, it’s been a really productive day!
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The Tanuki Beach Resort: Date 20220816 
吾輩は狸である progress: 4.45% 
Chapter two begins!
Japanese found in the sand
Meowords
無差別「むさべつ」ー Without discrimination; indiscriminate
器量「きりょう」ー Looks; features; facial beauty
不器量「ぶきりょう」ー Ugly; unattractive; plain
牡蠣「かき」ー Oyster; oyster shell
迂濶「うかつ」ー Thoughtless; careless; unobservant
独言「どくげん」ー Talking to yourself
伝声「でんせい」ー Verbal message
肴「さかな」ー Appetiser or snack served with drinks
高利貸し「こうりがし」ー Usurer; loanshark
偏屈「へんくつ」ー Narrow minded; bigoted; stubborn; obstinate
根性「こんじょう」ー Will-power; guts; spirit
艶「つや」ー Gloss; lustre; shine
Forms
糟 ＝ 滓「かす」(Dregs; sediment; leftovers; by-product; worthless item; scum
一疋 ＝ 一匹「いっぴき」 (One small animal)
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This is a great victory! Small accomplishments add up to a lot. (I remind myself, as I look at the list of tiny things I have crossed off today’s to-do list and reassure myself that it’s ok to stop now…)
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