📚📚 Read every day challenge - Summer 2022 🏖 ☀

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Turns out I did not leave off on pg 82 of 明日をくれた君に last time, but rather pg 83, so that post’s been updated. Good thing is that, in rereading it, I figured out a construction that I couldn’t last time, so that’s good. Today I left off on pg 110, reading 27 pages and finishing ch 2!

They started discussing こころ a bit, which I feel like I’d understand a lot better if I’d actually read the book, but uh… I don’t think I’m ready for that yet lol. I also don’t have it yet. I’m collecting 海王社文庫’s 朗読CD付 versions of classics (wherein a popular seiyuu reads a passage from each), and I’m hoping to get their version of こころ at some point as well.

spoilers/speculation

Hmm so it’s seeming like 図書委員の佐藤先輩 isn’t 佐藤くん. Since Satou-kun doesn’t want Midzuki to know who he is, if he’s Satou-senpai then when Midzuki interacts with him it could be that it’s an act so she doesn’t find him out, but then the chapter ends with the latest letter she gets from Satou-kun reading, “藍原さんに、会いたい.” Doesn’t exactly sound like the words of someone who’s been interacting with her!

I kind of don’t think he’d go that far, either. When she tries to talk to him, Satou-senpai doesn’t seem to want her to, seems to just want to be left alone. (Of course, he does warm up to her and he does finally give her that book recommendation she’d asked for the first time she talked to him, but. That’s later.) But Satou-kun likes her romantically, so if he had the chance to interact with her as himself, especially without her actually knowing it’s him, wouldn’t he want to take it? Of course, he could have his reasons.

I’m also still not discounting that “Satou” is an alias. Sugiura could possibly be Satou-kun, then. He’s definitely important to the story, and at the end of this chapter, Midzuki had an interaction with him wherein she realized that he’s a nice person, contrary to how he looks and his reputation as a delinquent. She’d hurt her hand, and when he patted her head as he left the library, he left a band-aid on top of her head to put on her injury! Yeah, they do kind of know each other, but they’ve never really interacted before here, at which point the “I want to meet you” note is already in the book, and he’s surprised that Midzuki knows his name.

I suppose it’s technically possible that we haven’t met Satou-kun yet, but since this is chapter 2 out of 6 (nearly halfway through the novel page-wise), it’s almost certainly one of these two. I was originally thinking the librarian kid, a.k.a. Satou-senpai, but that was before Midzuki started actually interacting with him—and suspecting that he’s Satou-kun! —so early. Right now I’m definitely leaning toward it being Sugiura-kun.

Also if Sugiura is the love interest, then it would be ironic (hilarious) because Midzuki’d go from boggling at Ritsu because “you’re dating Kaito-kun who’s amazing, yet you’ll fawn over Sugiura-kun of all people?” to. dating him. lmao (Well, ‘fawn over’ might not really be the right word, but)

「そこ、どいてもらっていいですか」

Am I so used to hearing “どいて!” that どく sounds rude to me despite it not being inherently so, or is that still kinda rude but wrapped up in politeness? (Also, is he referring to her as そこ [like そこの方 but less polite] or is he asking her to move from there?)

Some vocab of note:

割り箸 (わりばし) [noun] disposable chopsticks
程なくして (ほどなくして) [expression] after a short while; not long after; soon; before long; shortly thereafter

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:spiral_calendar: Day 90: September 28th :herb: :sunflower:

👓 ななか 6⁄17 Volume 1 (56% ➨ 67%)

I’ve been meaning to re-watch the anime for this for some time now, having previously watched it over a decade ago. I probably will as I work through the manga. Now I’m wondering if this made it into the anime in some form, as it’s text-based:

That is, assuming the anime followed the manga closely enough. I’m on chapter four now, and so far there’s only been two or three scenes that I’ve remembered.

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:tiger2: :books: The Tanuki Falling Leaf Party: Date 20220929 :fallen_leaf: :raccoon:

吾輩は狸である progress: 37.39% :dark_sunglasses:

The investigation into who the intruder was begins.

:chestnut: Japanese found within the acorns :chestnut:

Meowords

出来損ない「できそこない」ー Failure; defective article; botch
黒繻子「くろじゅす」ー Black satin

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Home post :bookmark:

Spice & Wolf (30 → 40%)
Honzuki 11 (14 → 17%)

Had lots of free time today, so I spent some of it on reading. Totally not procrastinating school work or anything. Either way, it felt nice spending an entire evening on Japanese for once. I learned:

  1. The importance of routine must not be underestimated.
  2. In which, skipping breakfast has no place in my morning routine.
  3. My room has bad insulation :snowman: Campus will provide better study sessions.
  4. Bed is still a good place for reading - warm and cozy like a kotatsu.
  5. A bunch of new words.
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September 29 :heavy_check_mark: :crab:

化身, 40-50%

Going into a story completely blind is interesting. I’ve read more than 1/3 of the story, and still have no idea where it’s going. Frankly, it could be going anywhere, and it could very well turn out to not be a horror story at all (the first one only barely counted as one in my book). There was a possible hint right at the end of today’s reading, but who knows. Hopefully I will know tomorrow. :eyes:

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September 29th!

Today I read Chapter 8 of Flying Witch.
My reading was a bit more fragmented than usual though.
I started reading during my lunch break, but the chapter was longer than I thought it would be so I ran out of time and had to stop part way through. Then I carried on for a bit after work thinking it would be a while until my husband got back and I’d have time to finsh - but he arrived home a bit earlier than I expected so I stopped reading again so we could go out for dinner.
Then I finally finished when I got home after we’d eaten and had a nice walk!

So maybe not the most efficient way of reading a chapter of a book, but hey - I read it! Thats the important thing. :grin:

(Home Post)

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I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me to recommend this to you before, but I think you might like 闇祓 | L28 (read: やみはら). It will probably end up closer to ~35 once graded, but I’ve very much back burnered it because I can only read it on my laptop as I bought it off Honto instead of my other usual spots. I hate reading long form on my laptop :neutral_face:

It starts out seeming like a typical like ‘oh, high school kids and demons!’ type story but it gets…more interesting than that? I don’t know how to explain it without ruining it, but it’s very much tense, psychological discomfort that dips its toes in horror a few times. It also moves on past the high school setting after the first section. The book is very intentionally trying to make you feel uncomfortable, or at least that was how it felt for me which also contributed to not having finished it yet :sweat_smile:

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Last day to post here, but I got to Chapter 1-4 of 青ブタ9 and did just a little bit of Danganronpa V3. I expect to be playing this one for a while at this rate. Perhaps when I finish 青ブタ in a couple weeks I’ll put all my reading time into Danganronpa, since I have Nier and Persona 5 coming in October.

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September 29 :blossom: Home Post

Played some モノマギア today! Not really sure where it’s going yet, but I’m intrigued :eyes:

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:butterfly: Home :butterfly:

ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 48

55 - 60

I went to bed at about 2:30 this morning because I was building a new shelf and arranging it :sweat_smile: photos soon to come.

Hopefully I’ll read a lot more tonight. I’m also thinking of changing my reading order from Part 7 next to Part 4 since I’m missing 5 volumes from 7 but only 1 from 4. For Part 2, I’m missing only 1 as well, but I expect it to be difficult to find. For Part 6, I’m missing the most important volume, the first one and 1-2 others. I’m missing about half of 8, so I’m not even considering it yet.

I’m also thinking of taking a break from JoJo after vol 48 in order to read the remaining vols of おじさまと(ねこ) so that I can sell/get rid of those volumes.

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:spiral_calendar: Day 91: September 29th :strawberry: :hibiscus:

spacer:bust_in_silhouette: シャドーハウス Volume 1 (31% ➨ 38%)

Time to fall a little behind in the Shadows House book club, as that first chapter for this past week (my reading tonight) had quite a bit to it. Maybe I can push to be caught up again this weekend!

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Home

According to my bookmeter calendar, today is my 200th day reading Japanese in a row! Unfortunately, I was tired after work, so I didn’t end up reading much, just the last 9 eps of はじめてのおつかい. Finally I’ve finished it though lol. That’s actually only the second show I’ve watched in its entirety during these three months

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Thank for the recommendation. I had seen this book mentioned here and there, and had been keeping it in mind, but the promise of tense, psychological discomfort is what made me put it on my list! :smiley:

I’m absolutely unable to read on my laptop. Not anything longer than a forum post at least. I think it’s the same reaction I have to youtube videos - if it’s on the computer, it isn’t proper content, and is therefore a waste of time (even when it isn’t!). My brain is weird. :sweat_smile:

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I’ve continued to plod along most days. I’m now up to date with all my book clubs except, predictably, Tugumi. Having said that, I’m at least consistent in being about one week behind, so I’m not really falling further back.

I will finish the book, thought it’s about to go on its third overseas holiday (I realise I’m very lucky to have 3 overseas trips in 4 months, all for diving). I think it‘s going to be the most well travelled library book I ever borrowed.

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Main Post

Plans changed a little, but I have kept reading at the very least. Some people might have already seen it on bookmeter, I’m reading One Piece. I was ready to read The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (even put it apart), however I noticed that through jump+ the official Japanese website (or one of them) there is a period of free reading certain arcs. This is because of promotion for the one piece movie Red. Anyway the first big part is about a 100 chapters and when I started there wasn’t that much left in the period, so I just decided to get through each mini-arc one at a time. So I read volume 1, then continued with buggy and then kuro. Yesterday I noticed the period was extended, so I have started the baratie or don krieg arc. This means that was what supposed to be one-off thing turned out to be me reading roughly (as I read chapter 1 and 2 before) 5 volumes in two weeks.

I’m not sure how long it lasts, but if I can read through the entirety of East Blue I would be happy. Either way I’m just gonna enjoy it for as long as I can. Aside from that I have also played a little bit of DQX offline and Persona 4 Golden on the side.

This is also the last day of the extended summer challenge. Just look at my main post to get an overview of everything I read over this period. I’ll be joining the fall challenge as well. Continuing with One Piece and also diving back into whatever I have lying around.

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:tiger2: :books: The Tanuki Falling Leaf Party: Date 20220930 :fallen_leaf: :raccoon:

吾輩は狸である progress: 38.27% :dog2:

Today the worst thing possible was said by the humans. The humans wished that the cat was a dog, that the highly esteemed Wagahai-cat is no good, and just eats food all day.

Hopefully see all you guys in the fall thread! :fallen_leaf:

:chestnut: Japanese found within the acorns :chestnut:

Meowords

狡猾「こうかつ」ー Sly; cunning; crafty

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September 30 :heavy_check_mark: :crab:

化身, 50-59%

Last day updating this thread, then it’s on to the Fall Challenge! :maple_leaf:

And I finished the story with perfect timing. Tomorrow I’m free to resume reading 十角館の殺人 and find out how all my theories were completely off the mark.

So, my thoughts on 雷魚. I liked it. It held my interest throughout, and like the previous story it had some great nature/weather descriptions that made me feel like I was there. Was it horror? Technically I suppose, but only to the extent that Ogawa Mimei’s stories can be horror too. Probably milder than some of them, even. It was actually kind of heartwarming, and definitely not scary, although there was an air of mystery throughout . I’m curious if the last story continues the not-really-horror pattern. I think I read in some reviews that it’s the scariest? Not that that’s a tough score to beat.

Lucky book! Now you need to also take it underwater at least once. In a waterproof bag of course, but it will certainly have something unique to boast about to its pals back in the library! :tropical_fish:

How dare they! And, erm, how exactly is a dog any different, according to those silly humans? Every dog I know just basically eats food all day, or would if food was available all day. :dog:

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:books: September 30 :books:
(home post)

The extended summer challenge is over, and I can say with confidence, I’ve read about once a week all this month. Well, I’ve read in a book that often.

Yesterday, I grazed a free for a limited time random manga to try out my new kobo, and make sure I’d set up my brand spanking new Rakuten account correctly. Will know that fully when I try to buy a book.

I’ve also spent September rewatching Ouran High School Host Club for the umpteenth time. Although this was the first time I watched it with Japanese subtitles. Before I’ve only had one with English subtitles available (the kind that can’t be turned off), but Netflix currently has OHSHC, so go watch it if you’ve never seen it. It is a hoot, even if they save most of the story development for the end.

I partly watched it because I wanted an idea of how hard the manga will be, as is usual, the anime only covers part of the whole manga’s run, and I’ve been assured of a more complete ending to the manga than the anime. The anime has an end for sure, but it doesn’t answer all the questions (far from it). But I wouldn’t have watched it a million times if it didn’t have an end. I abhor stories without an end, so I often don’t start reading a series until the story/arc is done. (Curse the person who recommended Name of the Wind to me, as a fellow fantasy reader I thought they’d mention if the series wasn’t finished, so foolishly I read the first book and got super hooked. I refuse to read more until it is done.)

Anyway, today I finished the last few episodes of Ouran and my verdict is… I think most of it will be fine, and then there will be lack of vocabulary spikes when the more outlandish kinda episodes/chapters happen. I even noticed several recent level vocabulary items, so mid-40s are proving relevant.

I might want to read a few very different things from what I’ve read so far, perhaps in some other settings like on a beach or whatever, to ease the potentially more lookup heavy chapters, but outside that I think Ouran manga would be a fairly nice read. Many lookups probably but not so many I’d go crazy.


So that is the end of this challenge. Starting tomorrow, I will try to jump back on the horse in the fall challenge, but I’ll also remind myself that even just 2-3 pages is fine. I don’t have to read a lot, just try reading some.

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It is so good :sob: but yeah, the wait is awful!

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So very very good. But I’m afraid, considering how long the last one is taking… that it is gonna be gone over so many times the magic will be gone. More work doesn’t always mean better work. Also losing the spark of the story is a real possibility at these kind of time intervals. After all, how disheartening is it to work on something for so long. Not to mention having the fans of the work figuratively watching over the shoulders… :confused:

Another reason I wait until it is finished, so I can learn if something actually manages to end well. :worried:

But my fingers are crossed :crossed_fingers: that it will turn out well.

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