📚📚 Read every day challenge - Summer 2022 🏖 ☀

I wasn’t sure where I was gonna post this—but it is about reading, so I figured here would be good—today I’m feeling uninterested in all my current reads. I don’t know why. Maybe because I spent so much time talking about Loopers and Orange the past couple of days, so I feel a bit talked out but like also applying to reading those and reading in general. (Also to note, I am tired after I had a very poor night’s sleep, so I expect to feel more 元気 tomorrow (as long as I get to sleep).)

I will probably pick up something and read a couple of pages just to be able to mark off the day, but anyone have any tips for what they do when they feel like this? Even if you know it will only feel like this for one day, do you have any tips for getting excited about what you are reading so you’re still able to pick up your current books? Or do you have some other strategy (like grazing another book as is my probable plan)?

I kinda want to get back to my current in-progress books/manga, I don’t need to add another to them. :sweat: I know if I could just get the energy/enthusiasm up, I’m happy with all the things I’m currently reading.

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To be honest, my strategy is just not to read if I don’t feel like it. Just reading a couple of pages as due diligence seems about right. Maybe those couple of pages will inspire you, but if not, you can try tomorrow. Some days we just need to do something different.

I teach English literature for a living, and during the school term I almost never feel like reading for fun, and I always feel guilty about this: I’m a reader; I should be reading! But the guilt actually makes me feel LESS like reading, even when summer vacation rolls around. In the last couple of years I’ve let myself completely off the hook (“Maybe I just don’t like reading any more, so I’ll do other stuff”), and this summer I’ve found myself reading like mad, mostly English translations of Japanese novels on top of my daily reading in Japanese. Sometimes it just comes around again out of nowhere, and when it does, it feels great.

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:tiger2: :books: The Tanuki Beach Resort: Date 20220716 :beach_umbrella: :raccoon:

Today I read: オオカミとウサギ :rabbit2: :wolf:

A folktale from Hukumusume, from Hyōgo Prefecture. About rabbits and a wolf, a short cute story to restore the balance after all that no longer humaning.


Replies

Thank you! And yes! Though no idea what to read next :thinking:
Sure something will suddenly pop up in my head.

Thanks again! :slightly_smiling_face:

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:cow2: :books: July 16 :books: :cow2:
(home post)

Grazing of multiple manga :cow2: a few pages in many different series

So I ended up pulling up the sample for multiple manga series I own to see if any of them would interest me. But none of them that were easy enough caught me.

I wish I had more ホテル・メッツァペウラへようこそ to read. :sob:

I think I was trying to find something among what I own that could replace that. Something entertaining with not too many unknown words, that I don’t feel the need for full comprehension on. 舞妓さんちのまかないさん came very close to fitting that bill, but there was quite a bit of Kyoto-ben (which I guess is kansai ben) in that, and I haven’t read much of that, so beyond the へん instead of ない, I don’t know the other particulars…

And I’m kinda disinclined to add another book to my currently reading pile. :pensive:

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Tanuki returns. :eyes:

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Yay I read 8 pages and finished my second book 5分で読める恐怖のラストの物語. Some of the short stories were awesome other not so much but I still enjoyed reading that book. What to do next maybe playing one of my video games in japanese I have some which were never translated or I may get TSUGUMI and join the book club, or maybe I should finish one of the visual novels I started and never finished. Of course I also could try to pass my next japanese test.

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July 16th!

I was out for almost the whole day today so I didn’t start reading until really late - a little past 11pm.
So just a little bit of reading for me today - the next chapter of Teasing Master Takagi-san.
It was a fun chapter, but I might re-read it on another day to make sure I understood it all correctly since I was super tired while I was trying to read. So there were a few times where I had trouble understanding.
I feel like I got all of the main points though :slight_smile:

(Home Post)

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:sunny: :books: Kimera’s Home Post :books: :sunny:

Hi, joining the party late but it’s still summer, right?

Goal: read something every day. Trying to keep it very simple, so I probably won’t be page tracking.

Jul
01 02 03
04 05 06 07 08 09 10
11 12 13 14 15🌸 16🌸 17 :newspaper_roll: :cherry_blossom:
18 X 19🌸 20🌸 21🌸 22🌸 23🌸 24 X
25 X 26 X 27 X 28 X 29 X 30 X 31 X
(more details)

Reading List:
:cherry_blossom: Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle vol 1, chapters 1-3
:newspaper_roll: “Easy” news articles (using an app called Todai)
X = Hiatus July 24-31
(Total = 8/17)

Aug
01 X 02 X 03 X 04 X 05 X 06 X 07 X
08 X 09 X 10 X 11 X 12 X 13🌸 14🌸
15🌸 16🌸 17🌸 18🌸 19🌸 20🌸 21🌸
22🌸 23 :closed_book: 24🌸 25🌸 26🌸 27🌸 28🌸
29 X 30 X 31🌸
(more details)

Reading List:
X = Hiatus Aug 1-12
:cherry_blossom: = Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle vol 1, chapters 3-5; vol 2 chapter 1
:closed_book: = Other one-off things
(Total = 17/31; or 17/19 without that break)

(End of challenge wrap-up post)

Sep
01X 02 :cherry_blossom: 03 :frog: 04 X
05 :frog: 06 :blue_book: 07 :blue_book: 08 X 09 :frog: 10 :frog: 11
12 13 14 15 16 17 18
19 20 21 22 23 24 25
26 27 28 29 30

Reading List:
:cherry_blossom: = Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle vol 2.
:frog: Hunter x Hunter vol 1 for the book club
:closed_book: = Other one-off things

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yesterday i read just one chapter of my current manga, which is already the easy choice because i was a bit exhausted from the LN. and my plan today is to also just read one chapter, and unless i feel super inspired, to leave it at that. instead, watch some anime (with english subs), or play a game (in english). i’ve been working on japanese quite hard this last month or so, and it’s probably time i gave myself a breather. and that’s okay ^^

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Home post :bookmark: July 16th :beach_umbrella:

・ わたしの幸せな結婚 (26% → 81%)

夢中になってしまって… つい :caught_durtling: already 1:30 am? whoops
// And I’ve totally neglected the listening challenge the past two days, aaaah :joy: yabai

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Summary Post

July 16th
What did I read?: 猫には猫の猫ごはん Vol 1
How much did I read?: 15 pages
How long did it take me?: 14 min

Kitty times :pleading_face:

In this chapter we learn that Taiyou is basically my spiritual twin when it comes to cooking, like he had to buy all of his cooking implements just to make the food for this cat because he does not cook for himself. He also struggles hard to chop carrots into small pieces (so much same, chopping stuff is one of a million cooking things that seems like it should be simple but somehow :tired_face:). Luckily his friend Tetsu is apparently a decent home cook - Tetsu can’t stand to watch how hard Taiyou is struggling and finally shows him a better way to do it :joy: I love Taiyou’s amazement at Tetsu’s carrot chopping skills because honestly same, I don’t know how people do this

Next chapter, they’re going to a cat cafe :hugs: I am excited

@Zakarius very late congrats on finishing No Longer Tanuki Human! :tada:

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I’m pretty tired out today so who knows if I’ll have energy for 硝子の塔の殺人 later but I impulse bought the first volume of 少女革命ウテナ (manga) and omg, such nostalgia. Surprisingly it wasn’t on Natively yet so I added it, and I finished the first volume between last night and today. Will probably buy the remaining volumes (there’s only 5 total? How?!) to see how much it differs from the show.

I’m a little leery of grading it on Natively when it shows up, though, as it’s the easiest thing I’ve read in a long while and any time I put something in the low/mid 20s I worry I’m misremembering what things at that level are like. I also don’t own anything near that level anymore (gave away to friends) so just have to do my best off memory. :grimacing:

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ooh! i never even thought of reading ウテナ! that was the first anime i ever really watched, and i’ve watched that at least 4 times by now! and you say that it’s not too terribly difficult?

that’s going on my reading list for sure!

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:house:
17th of July

Read page 108 to page 110 (30 – 31%) of かがみの孤城. Steady progress, for now.

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It was probably the first one I ever saw too! The show gets crazy at the end and of course the movie was wild so I’m very curious to see how far the manga goes. It has full furigana and the majority of the sentences are short and sweet, pretty straight forward. There is of course some less common vocab but it’s repeated so much that if you don’t know 決闘 or 刻印 before you start you will by the time you end :joy:

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Not sure I have a plan, but I think if I don’t feel like reading anything current I’ll aim to read a few pages of the Bookwalker trial chapters of books that seem interesting.

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July 16 :blossom: Home Post

Today was kind of a weird one haha; my long-awaited steam deck arrived today so naturally all I wanted to do was mess around with it, which somehow led to me playing the beginning of Steins;Gate :joy: My friend’s been playing it so it’s been on my mind, and it was an excuse to play on the steam deck so :man_shrugging:

I didn’t play all that much of it so I don’t have a very informed opinion yet, but so far it’s easier than I expected? I mean yes there’s sciencey stuff obviously, and main boy is chuunibyou mode of course, but like… it was pretty smooth going! It felt easier than バディミッションBOND generally has which seems weird? But I guess I’m familiar enough with the spike chunsoft brand of writing to be unfazed :joy: The glossary thing is fun too, love reading explanations of chuunibyou terms, very helpful actually!

But yeah the hardest part was definitely the beginning, there were whole monologues, one of which didn’t have subtitles so that put me to the test :laughing: but I think it was generally okay! Definitely like having actual dialogue boxes I can go through at my own pace though.

I don’t know that I’d necessarily call it a “strategy” but I definitely have days where I’m like “hmm I want to read something that isn’t any of these” and generally I just… do that? :joy: I’m very chaotic about it all though lmao, this is how I end up with a billion projects :sweat_smile: (how many of my posts on here have been like “guess what else I started today,” even this one rip) Sometimes those spur-of-the-moment reads become something really great though! You never know :sparkles:

I’m also chronically really bad about actually continuing with things I enjoy, like logically I know I’ll have fun watching/reading/playing whatever it may be, but mustering the motivation to pick it up again once I’ve put it down?? Wild :joy: Every time I play バディミッションBOND I’m like “I never want to stop playing this ever” and then the instant I do it’s like I completely forget lmao

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Home

I read the preview for 王国の子. It seems interesting, but I had trouble reading it, and not just because the text was small in places (especially for furigana, and there’s a not-insignificant amount of “text that says what they mean with furigana that says what they actually say”) and I couldn’t zoom in, so it’s definitely a low-priority series for me to get.

I read 25 whole pages of 2.43 today, reading all of ch 1-7 SUPERHERO and leaving off on pg 144. Next will be the first subchapter of ch 2 ユニチカ包囲網, SPLIT, which is gonna be from Yuni’s POV! Yeah I got sucked in and ended up reading a lot, even with translating a bit here and there as I went.

Anyway, the practice match finally starts, and we get a bunch of explanations of positions and their roles, who plays what, different types of attacks, etc. in between notable plays. It’s more explanation-heavy at the beginning since it’s just 25 consecutive side outs (which is notable in itself, since Fukuhou are the reigning champions of the prefecture and Seiin are a total no-name school, but not very exciting to write about), but then it starts to focus more on the match after that when Fukuhou are hoping for a break and finally get it on the 28th point. Honestly while reading that match, I felt a lot like when after watching an ep I’d feel all ふわー inside and could hardly string two intelligible words together (like idk halfway through the series, I saw people writing these long posts after each ep and decided I wanted to too, but I wasn’t coherent enough to properly write anything after any of them except surprisingly the last). Definitely more exhausted though, that was a lot.

Finally I get to see what all’s written on Subaru’s sports bottle! Aside from スバル専用 and ヒトには毒, which I already knew (they’re visible in the anime), there’s also ゲロ甘 and ひでぶ. Each of them was written by one of the third-years (I keep forgetting Yuuhi’s a third-year, I keep thinking he’s a second-year), and Ochi has written a message in small letters on it too, but he doesn’t say what it is. Also, I know what the first three mean, but I can’t figure out the fourth.

Title drop!〝三村統〟という、他人の夢で作りあげられたスーパーヒーローの〝正体〟を見てしまった気がして、心臓がどきりとした。(Plus we get Ochi calling him a hero a couple times before then.)

Lately I’ve been seeing more of 福井弁’s tendency to drop the く in the connective and negative forms of い-adjectives, and it’s kinda tripping me up a bit. (Not all くs drop, just in such cases as, say, らしくなる, which becomes らしなる; 悪くない becomes 悪ない; 行きたくない to 行きたない; etc.)

Some vocab of note:

基本中の基本 (きほんちゅうのきほん) [expression, noun] the most basic of basics
来す (きたす) [他サ五] to cause; to induce; to bring about a result or state; to produce
布陣 (ふじん) [noun, する verb] battle formation. lineup (for a game).
内訳 (うちわけ) [noun] itemization (of expenses); the items; breakdown; classification
末恐ろしい (すえおそろしい) [い-adj.] frightening (of the future); worrying; scary; ominous; portentous
参った (まいった) [interjection] I’m beaten; I give up. Never expected that to be the kanji used for it. But also I didn’t know 参る could also mean “to be defeated; to collapse; to die,” only “to go; to come; to visit.”
炸裂 (さくれつ) [noun, する verb (自)] violent explosion; bursting
涙もろい (なみだもろい) [い-adj.] easily moved to tears; given to weeping; lachrymose
十八番 (おはこ) [noun] one’s favorite party trick; one’s specialty; one’s forte
度肝を抜く (どぎもをぬく) [expression, カ五] to astonish; to astound; to stupefy; to flabbergast; to strike a person dumb; to dumbfound; to take someone aback; to boggle someone’s mind
下敷きになる (したじきになる) [expression, ラ五] to be pinned under; to be squashed by
弱冠 (じゃっかん) [noun] youth; early age; tender age of…. Can also mean “twenty years of age.”
首を洗って待つ (くびをあらってまつ) [expression, タ五] to wait for one’s punishment; to wait before one gets what’s coming; to wash one’s neck and wait (for one’s own beheading). Used in the imperative as a threat.

Found a lot of interesting ones today! Though with how much I read today, I’m not really surprised lol

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I think it’s cute too! Our daughter is almost two and still spends most of the night sleeping between my husband and I. She is our only little monkey after years of wanting and not being able to have kiddos, so she definitely gets alllll the cuddles!

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:house:Home Post

Day 15

:open_book:カリスタルハンータズ 本2

:arrow_right: [||||||||81%]

:face_with_monocle: Grammer, grammer, and more grammer tripping me up. And homophones. Curse you いる and 居る!

:thinking: Read the book guide, but I think it’s time to fire up BunPro again. I got overwhelmed with everything I was doing to learn Japanese a while ago, so I decided to commit to one thing I could do consistently. Since I paid for WaniKani…:woman_shrugging:t2:BUT. The more vocab and kanji I learn the more I realize that the nuances of grammar can completely change the meaning of a sentence. I need to get back to it!

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