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 )
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.
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.
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!
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…)
Today I finished 海辺のカフカ（上）. I only started recording my reading time from page 155 onwards, sadly. Here is the reading time for everything I read everything whose reading time I recorded (I’m missing maybe 2-3 hours of manga reading in here) in that timespan:
For カフカ, this equals an average reading speed of 9.6 pages per hour. I suspect this is rather thanks to Nakata than to Oshima, though Anyways, if we assume that I read the first 150 pages at the same speed, then it means that it took me about 50 hours (across 38 reading days) to read the whole book.
Next plans are Flesh&Blood vol. 3, and Kafka part 2 from Saturday.
Read p. 16-30 of よつば& Vol 2 today. A milestone: my first time looking up a kanji on Jisho.org using the radical search! One day I will be able to read something without furigana…
New words:
見つける (みつける): to discover
影 (かげ): shadow (this was the one I looked up)
ひょっとして: by any chance
そっくり: exactly like; spitting image of
ビクッと: with a start, with a jump
配達 (はいたつ): delivery
見間違える (みまちがえる): to misperceive, to misjudge
やっぱし: casual やっぱり
Feeling kinda feverish, so I just read the subtitles of a youtube video today. I’m totally exhausted after work, but I hope a good night’s sleep will help.
I’m really looking forward to your FFXIV updates! I love XIV too, and it’s a dream to be able to play it in Japanese. I’m going to live vicariously through you from now on Good luck!
I hope you feel better soon. I think reading when you feel blergh definitely counts as a victory.
All of my book club reading for this week is finished so I’m back to Yotsuba today
Todays chapter involved looking for stones at the beach, and was a very lovely chapter with some beautiful artwork.
I look forward to the day when I can read your post! Hopefully not too fashionably late xD
Yes! 一志! Miyo has come so far, I love it. Author did us good regarding 新 xD I didn’t expect that he’d actually do something Evil, but look at him go betraying us like that.
I’ll write this in a separate spoiler in case you haven’t finished the book yet: And then boom, done 甘水 arc. That arc really went from 0 to 100 real quick, and then basically back to 0 again. Almost getting whiplashed here. And then marriage! Not quite yet, unfortunately, but looks like it’s on the horizon I can’t wait! x3
Sorry I was too lazy to post in this thread. Today I played Monobeno and finished half a chapter in it. I need to get back to playing visual novels I still have around 30 to finish.
Read 8 more pages in the Shin Kanzen Master Reading N2 book I’m nearly done. The texts in it are not that hard but answering the questions is still a challenge. Four days ago I started doing the Nihongo So Matome Reading JLPT N1 6 week course. It’s pretty hard and there is lots of stuff to memorize. But the cats are so cute.
My reading focus for the last few days have been low. Ended my day (just now) with playing a little SMO to get some Japanese practice in. The kingdom tourist leaflets are as incomprehensible as they usually are. Wouldn’t be a problem if I looked up stuff, but SMO is my most casual reading that I still feel comfortable calling reading. (And mostly because I do try to read those stupid leaflets.)
Having a “which one to pick/do” problem not only in reading but also a bit in life in general. Got stuck in a kinda “which one should I do” rut, so I’ve ended up not doing any of the things I’ve needed. Hopefully I’m breaking that tomorrow.
For reading specifically, I think a bit of my problem is that I think: of the club reading picks, I should read Orange first, so I can fill in the vocab sheet and, you know, to feel like I proper shepherd/leader of the Orange book club. But I think that, maybe, this week, I wanted to either read Loopers first or catch up with Night Café. So instead so far I’ve only read those 13 pages of Orange I did yesterday.
What is best and what I want to do, so seldom agrees on the same thing.
PS. My grammar sucks when I’m this tired (basically off to bed as soon as I finished this), and while I think I fixed the worst unclear sentences, I might have missed a couple. Peace, and good night!
So, I’m guessing marriage + trip to Kyoto (meeting a bunch of new people BUT ALSO her family again). Since it’s too much money to give up on, I assume the editors will milk it into 2+ volumes with some plot. Calling it now!
August 16th
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?: 9 min
The definition of low effort today The chapter I read today was kind of funny though, Rieko went to buy a bottle of water for Ponta from the vending machine but the vending machine gave her coffee instead. She doesn’t like coffee, but proceeds to try and drink it anyway for some reason xD Then gives up and decides to take it home to her dad, but spills a bunch of it on her shirt as she starts running home.
I feel like I will be in bare minimum mode for…most of the rest of the month, I’m guessing. Things are happening and work is a lot right now, I just can’t prioritize Japanese. Gotta prioritize my own sanity and ability to function
Thanks for the encouragement you guys I am at least in a better mood today - still stressed but less overwhelmed and irritated about it
Was busy and tired today so only managed a couple quests, nothing too fancy.
Oooh that’s nice to read!! Hopefully I can make it worthwhile and entertaining . It’s going to take forever, though, with the amount of content in the game and my turtle speed. Hopefully it gets better at some point with more vocabulary. So far I’ve already been able to make like 10 cards so it’s a start (though many, many more lookups). With that and all, it is still hard for me so I’ll make sure to post my frustrations too .
Improvement . I hope you’re able to recover soon, no shame in reducing workload for a bit . I know I do! (in fact today is one of those “ticking a box” day for me, especially listening )
In a weird headspace today so probably going to be mostly offline. Drowning myself in reading sounds good today. In that vein, I finished 遅刻して来た幽霊 | L27 just now. It was fun, I liked it a lot. There were two stories in the collection which I thought were particularly enjoyable, but the rest were ok. The nice thing about short stories is that even if they kind of suck, there’re still short.
I hope I graded it ok - I started reading this back in March. So my memory of vocab and grammar spread is a bit weak. However, I finished the last two stories off recently and 赤川次郎 is generally pretty predictable to level.
also @Mrs_Diss I saw you started reading ウテナ！ I hope you’re enjoying it
It’s wild times out here guys, it happened: I finished 海辺のカフカ! Part one anyway, which means I’ve officially finished my first novel in Japanese! Feels pretty weird all around really, for one thing it’s just the first half so it doesn’t totally feel like a finished book that way but it’s a physical volume finished so there’s that. But finally after all my stops and starts with different novels, and playing like five whole VNs in the interim lmao, I finished one yay! Check off that language learning box Oh also belated thank you on the バディミッションBOND congratulations!! It’s been a wild couple of days haha.
Congrats again to everyone finishing up books and things, progress has been wild! Powerful stuff
Oof I’m sorry things are rough, I’m glad you’re taking care of yourself though! Japanese will be there for you whenever, your well-being always comes first I wish you the best!
August Week 1-15th 
)
August 15 
August 13
Good luck!
Aug 16th 
I can’t wait! x3
(And mostly because I do try to read those stupid leaflets.)
The chapter I read today was kind of funny though, Rieko went to buy a bottle of water for Ponta from the vending machine but the vending machine gave her coffee instead. She doesn’t like coffee, but proceeds to try and drink it anyway for some reason xD Then gives up and decides to take it home to her dad, but spills a bunch of it on her shirt as she starts running home. 
I am at least in a better mood today - still stressed but less overwhelmed and irritated about it 
. I hope you’re able to recover soon, no shame in reducing workload for a bit 
. I know I do! (in fact today is one of those “ticking a box” day for me, especially listening 
Feels pretty weird all around really, for one thing it’s just the first half so it doesn’t totally feel like a finished book that way but it’s a physical volume finished so there’s that. But finally after all my stops and starts with different novels, and playing like five whole VNs in the interim lmao, I finished one yay! Check off that language learning box 
Oh also belated thank you on the バディミッションBOND congratulations!! It’s been a wild couple of days haha.
I wish you the best!