📚📚 Read every day challenge - Summer 2022 🏖 ☀

[pocketcat]

@Hantsuki

I also started a vocab list for whoever wants to use it […]
I hesitate to post it in the discussion thread since it isn’t perfect

Even if not perfect someone might find it useful! I have my own vocab list except mine has no definitions at all because I just use yomichan when the word pops up again and I don’t remember it

@MissDagger

When it comes to Christy, do you know if they mentioned Poirot or Miss Marple or the independent stories more?

Poirot for sure but classics like ‘And then there were none’ I feel like were mentioned? But my memory could be getting confused there as I’m rereading (well, listening to the audiobook) for that right now
I haven’t finished it yet…

@MissDagger

The first one of these are being read by the mystery club on the Natively forums, isn’t it? If only I was anywhere close to being able to handle something like that.

Yes

Re: 江戸川乱歩 - his kid’s works are pretty accessible, but his adult works are hard. I haven’t finished any of his novels yet, only his short stories for adult works. I don’t recall any particular cases being mentioned though, just him referenced as being very formative/influential, and his title detective as well. So probably a short story to get a feel for his style / what they mean without the intense committment of one of his novels.
I do want to try reading 黄金仮面 again this year…but my copy is a paperback and I’m keeping up with the audiobook which is very much hard mode with this.

[DIO-Berry]

Home

ジョジョの奇妙な冒険25

Start - 12

Exhaustion and sleepiness kicked my butt.

[enbyboiwonder]

Home

Passed out yesterday before I could post, a combination of my lack of sleep catching up with me and feeling tired and weird after dental work (and I’ve got more today, bleh)

Finished 秘密が花園! The first couple’s cute, but the second is enemies to lovers (rather, one-sided rivalry to lovers), so ya I’m totally fine with the division of chapters lol. And it’s hilarious because this is the first year that Sakuradzuka Private (formerly Girls’) High School is co-ed, and out of the 7 boys who passed the entrance exams, 4 of them ended up being mlm. And then in one of the between-chapter short comics, the boy who didn’t get any lines in the story itself said that in the future (将来的に) it’ll be 5 out of 7. We never learn who the fifth is though, and I don’t think this one has a follow-up, but even if I’m curious, I’m fine with not knowing.

I also read all of よつばと! vol 1. I was a bit surprised to see Yotsuba’s speech using kanji in the first couple chapters, but she settled into her usual speaking style soon after. And, I finally know what it is Fuuka actually thinks Yoh-san’s job is: making konjac jelly.

Some vocab of note:

貧乏くじ (びんぼうくじ) [noun] short end of the stick; short straw
開口一番 (かいこういちばん) [四字熟語, adv.] at the very beginning of one’s speech; immediately upon opening one’s mouth; before anything else; first of all
解せない (げせない) [expression, い-adj.] inscrutable; incomprehensible
育ち盛り (そだちざかり) [noun, の-adj.] growth period (in children)
たわ言 (たわごと) [noun] nonsense; silly talk; drivel
テンパる [自ラ五] to be at one’s wits’ end; to be about to blow one’s fuse
冷え性 (ひえしょう) [noun] sensitivity to cold. My dictionary doesn’t seem to have an entry for “sensitivity to heat,” though, so I wonder what that would be…
見損なう (みそこなう) [他ア五] to misjudge (someone); to overestimate
未確認飛行物体 (みかくにんひこうぶったい) [noun] unidentified flying object

[Zakarius]

The Tanuki Beach Resort: Date 20220809

吾輩は狸である progress: 1.12%

The sentences are generally shorter than in No Longer Human, so it’s a bit easier to read in that regard, but there are so many words I don’t know that turn out to be old forms of words that I do know. It’s very stop-starty reading at the moment.

Japanese found in the sand

Meowords

同居「どうきょ」ー Co-existing; living together
同衾「どうきん」ー Sleeping together; sharing a bed
竃「かまど ／ へっつい」ー Kamado; traditional Japanese stove
筋向「すじむこう」ー Diagonally opposite (now written like: 筋向こう)
一部始終「いちぶしじゅう」ー The whole story; all the details; from beginning to end
毫も「ごうも」ー Not in the least; not at all

Forms
抛る ＝ 放る「ほうる」(to hurl/throw)
顫える ＝ 震える「ふるえる」(to shiver/shake)
剿滅 ＝ 掃滅「そうめつ」(Annihilation)
善い ＝ 良い「よい」 (Good)

[MarnieDEB]

Today: free-read the second story in よつば&! Vol. 2. Part of me wants to tell Yotsuba’s dad to stop her from going around shooting everyone, but she’s so freaking cute while she’s doing it…

[Redglare]

Home post Aug 9th

・ 本好きの下剋上 10 (11% → 14%)

Reading went well but then I had the following thought and got distracted after that:

I wonder if the word 油断 (negligence, carelessness) is related to the Chinese phrase 加油

The Chinese word means something like がんばって, literally composed of the characters for “add” and “oil”, and if I recall correctly it stems from staying up late to study and your source of light was an oil lamp. So you had to keep the lamp going to able to study more as it got darker. At least that’s how my Chinese teacher explained it.

Side story: I remember when I was taking a Chinese course for six weeks while taking my Japanese bachelor’s degree (due to lockdown preventing exchange program from happening so I had to get enough credits from elsewhere), and on one of my assignments I received some feedback which included the phrase 加油. I’m pretty sure the teacher meant well and was trying to be supportive (“ganbatte you’re doing great!”), but I (a complete beginner at studying Chinese) interpreted the word too literally as in “you need to add more oil = not enough study”, which at the time, made me kinda pissed xD Now it’s just a fun memory.

So anyway, maybe 油断 and 加油 aren’t actually related, but to me it’d make sense if they were. Stopping the oil = “neglecting” your studies

[lucylavelle]

August 9th!

I read the next two chapters of Shadow’s House today. I’m enjoying it so far, though it seems kind of sad. I’m really interested in seeing where the story goes, its all very mysterious at the moment.

(Home Post)

[MissDagger]

August 9
(home post)

Super Mario Odyssey
Night Café page 98 → 128 (31 pages)

Color me surprised when I noticed that I had actually read 2,5 pages the other day (of 8 of Night Café). Apparently I couldn’t even remember how much I read. Any case, I thought I gave myself an extra half page that day, but I shortchanged myself by as much.

Anyway, started the day with some SMO (and will probably play a little right after this too). Finishing Cloud Kingdom and Lost Kingdom (during first run through with story so not collecting all moons).

Then I spent about an hour (a little more) reading the rest of chapter 8 of Night Café. Nice to see Hanabi and Tina making friends, and Yamato revealing more of himself to Hanabi. Then I finally did what I’d meant to all along, and several hours later (aka in the evening), I read a second chapter of NC. This time chapter 9. For this chapter, it was nice to see Yamato being so nice and soft. And Risa/Lisa’s mother’s friend… shame on her. I get that she’s busy with her life and kids, but if you agree to check up on your friend’s child, you don’t get to come around first at 9 pm, leaving a kid without dinner and everything. If you can’t do better than that, you excuse yourself to your friend and say you can’t do anything, forcing the mother to figure something else out. Grrr…

Edit: Looks like I’ll be able to finish NC fairly soon (4 chapters left), and only join the club for the second volume one week late.

---

@pocketcat Thanks for all the advice. I have a feeling that after I finish off the current novel I’m reading (in English), I might just go on a mystery spree. xD The mystery spree in Japanese will have to wait. ^^

[rikaiwisdom]

Home post

REDC	月	火	水	木	金	土	日
Week 7

８月９日
Chrono Trigger

[MrGeneric]

@Redglare

if I recall correctly it stems from staying up late to study and your source of light was an oil lamp.

Makes me think of the English idiom, “to burn the midnight oil.” I love how often idioms seem to overlap (or are outright borrowed in some cases, but either way).

[enbyboiwonder]

Home

I read イケメン君とさえない君. I love Hideyoshico-sensei’s sketchy art style. It feels kinda, I dunno, soft and warm. I love the feeling of both her art and the story; this manga is definitely one of my faves. I also love this face that Saenai-kun will sometimes make lol

(Plus variations like when he’s ticked off or confused or when he’s like mrrgh, but the mouth stays the same lol)

Synopsis

The story follows our Saenai-kun, a 21-y.o. college student who’s always been plain, unassuming, and unlucky. Well, ever since kindergarten, at least. That was the spring of his life, and it’s all been downhill from there lmao. After getting hit in the head by a ball while walking through a park, he starts getting possessed by the ghost of Ikemen-kun’s girlfriend, who died last week in a traffic accident. She can only possess him while he’s unconscious, and aside from the time where she drank a lot of alcohol (both a lot volume-wise and a lot of kinds), she doesn’t do anything in his body aside from talk and hang out with Ikemen-kun. (So like, テレビゲームとか：〇 ｜ キスとか：✕) The two guys don’t interact much when Saenai-kun is himself, and Saenai-kun doesn’t really know anything about Ikemen-kun but his name, but he starts getting curious about him and starts to fall in love. It turns out, the three of them knew each other in kindergarten. The only time Saenai-kun has been cool in his life is when he saved a kid from a bully in kindergarten, a kid who was tiny and cute and a crybaby and whom he’d thought was a girl, but who was actually Ikemen-kun. The dead girlfriend was the bully, whom I think Saenai-kun had thought was a boy. Even though the two guys didn’t recognize each other, she did, and she also recognized their growing feelings for each other. Because of that, on top of her coming to understand that she can’t return to the way things were before she died, she’s able to move on.

Their names barely get mentioned in this manga, so I don’t really remember them. Ikemen-kun is Mashiba Hikaru, a.k.a. Hikari-chan (in kindergarten, plus Mii-chan’s nickname for him), the dead girlfriend is Mii-chan (or Micchan in kindergarten), and Saenai-kun is, uh… Shinohara? I don’t think his given name came up, but then again, it totally could’ve and I just don’t remember lol I’m terrible with names

I started 恋ではないと思いたい, reading the first 2 chapters.

Some vocab of note:

卒園 (そつえん) [noun, する verb (自)] finishing kindergarten; graduating from kindergarten
取り憑く (とりつく) [自カ五] to take hold of; to possess; to haunt. While this is transitive in English, in Japanese, the object of possession is marked with に.
辰年 (たつどし) [noun] year of the Dragon
こそばゆい [い-adj.] embarrassed; awkward; ill at ease
バンソーコ [noun] band-aid. Usually though it’s spelled ばんそうこう or バンソーコ―, or in kanji as 絆創膏 (dunno what’s most common, just that the spelling that appeared in this manga was marked as irregular).
もよおし [noun] event; festivities; function; social gathering
観覧車 (かんらんしゃ) [noun] Ferris wheel
あわせる顔がない [expression, い-adj.] too ashamed to meet

And now I’ve read 7 books in 9 days! I mean, they’re all manga, but still.

[natarin]

August 9 Home Post

I said I’d get through the investigation part I was on in バディミッションBOND and oh boy did I! All I did reading-wise today was play a bunch of it and it put me through my paces Things are definitely picking up and I don’t even know what to expect anymore, but I’m very curious

buddy bond!!

Let’s start off with モクマ and チェズレイ pinky-promising because I love them:

Very cute, one of the few wholesome things that happened today Well… they made it to the ファントム’s office and… hm. First of all he was talking about how he only had business with whoever had the code in their head which uh… ルーク was like “what code??” There’s a lot he doesn’t know yet, he’s gonna have a rough time. But then the ファントム was threating to put all of them in aggro mode except the person who has the code in their memories is immune to that sort of mind control apparently which will probably also lead to some rough times!! Anyway that got interrupted by a crane チェズレイ set up crashing into the building, and then the ファントム took off his アッカルド mask to reveal… ルーク’s dad??? I’m not clear on all the details yet of like, why, but yikes. So ルーク was having an awful time and チェズレイ moved to finally get his revenge but then ファントム shot モクマ and threw him off the building from the 51st floor they were on?? And チェズレイ jumped off after him with no hesitation and oh the parallels of that and when they first met? Oh man things are wild. Oh also イアン is apparently alive and super brainwashed and very feral so the people still in the building are dealing with that, and yeah that’s where that chapter left off! Things are bleak I have no idea how the next chapter is gonna start when half the main group are falling out of a skyscraper but

Uh yeah so a lot happened, if my word-vomit didn’t make that clear チェズレイ and ルーク especially are having quite the time, though ルーク’s been largely clueless, but チェズレイ knows some things:

Which thing is he even talking about? Who knows It feels like big reveal era lately, so stuff’s really gonna go down. Best of luck to all of them

@Hantsuki

I also started a vocab list for whoever wants to use it

Oh nice, thank you for sharing!

@Memoria

Decorating, showing off all my games and manga, buying some plants

Oooh yes, now that’s what makes all the stress worth it

[pocketcat]

I need life to calm down and stop being so busy. It feels like I’m ending each day with a longer to-do list than when I started.

I read more of 十角館の殺人. I suppose I’m around halfway done with the first reading assignment? Quite a few new words due to scene setting and such, but as expected the difficulty is easing off and it’s becoming a smoother read. At this rate I’ll finish the assignment well ahead of schedule and can indulge myself in other books for a bit before the next one.

[Sylph]

Woops, forgot to update yesterday

August 8

Read some ビブリア (19% → 21%) and played バリバリ for a bit over 30 mins.

August 9

Finally had a more productive day Japanese wise! I did my daily ビブリア reading (21% → 24%) but also read 2 chapters of 青のフラッグ and played バリバリ for 1:45 h, where I’m getting really close to the end of level 3 / 4 of my first route. That game is taking me foreverrr.

[MissDagger]

August 10
(home post)

Night Café page 129 → 141 (13 pages)

Read chapter 10 of NC today. It was nice to see some things come together and the growth that Hanabi has done. I’m really interested in the next chapter since it is called the same as the book, but I don’t have more time today.

Unfortunately I have to go have fun with friends. What a life I’m leading.

[ChristopherFritz]

Day 40: August 9th

ふだつきのキョーコちゃん Volume 6 (21% ➨ 39%)

スーパーマリオくん Volume 1 (35% ➨ 43%)

夜カフェ Volume 1 (89% ➨ 93%)

くノ一ツバキの胸の内 Volume 3 (84% ➨ 100%)

[Thud]

Main Post

Been a while since the last update. I’ve been a lot more free with reading and reviewing lately. Tried out some manga from jump+ which I do count as reading for the every day challenge, but it’s not included in my goals. Over the weekend I managed to finish Yoru Cafe volume 3, it had an ending I could feel at ease with. That’s really a good thing I feel with this series, you can read a volume and it will be mostly self contained. Of course it does build further upon it, but there’s no rush to have to read the next volume. The next book on the list is then zenitendo vol 3, I haven’t started reading yet but I can pick it up and read a story just fine.

Last sunday I started reading the Kindaichi manga series, which is kinda a what if the famous detective had a grandson that’s still going to school. Every volume or in this case file covers a single case. So with that in mind I thought it would probably be best to be able to read it in one go. Of course that proved to be a bit too much, I managed to read the first chapter which was about 80 pages or so and called it a day. That coincides with the discovery of the first victim and typically cutting off the cast from the outside world, locking them in with the killer. This then slowly turns into a serial killer case and of course kindaichi just happens to be there and solve the case. I’m very familiar with the series and its structure as I have seen parts of the anime and live action adaptations. What’s nice is that the chapter after that makes a small summary of the events before it, the victim(s) and details the name again. So I read another chapter on monday. Yesterday I was planning to read the third chapter, but I ended up reading the rest of it in one go. Very strange. This particular case is inspired by the phantom of the opera and I vaguely remembered it from before. I quite like it and reading it was a decent challenge. There’s hardly any furigana except for names and some emphasis here and there. Looked up a few words, but tried to mostly get by from context. I consider it a good in the genre and being manga kinda helps with seeing the tricks and how they are described. I have 3 more volumes and thus 3 more cases to read.

[MarnieDEB]

Free-read よつば&! Chapter 10 today. Now I want strawberry cake.

Not having a great day - lots of stressful stuff - but these arrived so I am stoked about that.

[pm215]

I like the cover design they’ve gone for there – keeping the title and author text subtle and out of the way so the focus is all on the full-page cover art.

[MarnieDEB]

Right? My husband picked them up and said, “Well, these are some beautiful little books.” And that black cat is so great. “Don’t touch my witch.”