Okay this convinced me. I had to listen to the whole thing.
I don’t regret anything 
That was awesome, thank you so much. And so random.
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Yesterday’s Reading Summary
- Previously mentioned chapter of Yotsuba&!
- それでも歩は寄せてくる chapters 40 and 41, 24 pgs. Just realized the bonus content is also part of this weeks assignment. Woops, guess I’ll wrap up the book today.
- Bash scripting. Yes, I was writing in English, but my errors were in Japanese. I’ll take it.
- Daily Animal Crossing: Missed a day yesterday. Pretty rare for me. Even missed a fishing tournament.
Today’s Goals
- Finish それでも歩は寄せてくる (vol 3)
- One or two chapters of Yotsuba&!
- Stop procrastinating on starting Eastward!!!
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January 9 update:
Read a page of 時をかける少女 again. This time I tried to only look up words I deemed necessary to get a general understanding of what’s going on (which was maybe 5-7 words for the page I read), and this made reading much more enjoyable. The intention was to compensate for this by reading more, but the page conveniently ended a chapter, and I was a bit short on time, so I decided to call it a day. Reading this way (this is what others seem to call “extensively” as opposed to “intensively”?) is much less onerous, so I feel like I can keep going for a long time – until I either finish the book or decide that I don’t want to finish it.
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January 9 
Home Post
Read 錆喰いビスコ again today, I’m really getting invested now (despite my better judgment haha, it’s definitely a higher level than I have any business reading at this point but 
). It’s really a love-hate relationship, like every time I start I feel like “omg this is so dense, I’m never gonna get through this” but then I finish that section and get sucked into some nonsense or emotions and suddenly it’s three pages later - there’ve been multiple days where I’ve completely missed my normal wk review time wading through it without even realizing
A lot of the more complex sentences take me a bit to figure out, but I really do love the way they’re written. Working with the text so closely might even be amplifying it actually; I was getting pretty emotional while it was talking about ビスコ and ジャビ’s relationship, and ビスコ being so adamant that he won’t let ジャビ die and getting really upset when ジャビ tried to get him to accept it and just :’( even though I’ve barely known these characters for like a chapter. The power of literature 
But yeah I read four pages in basically one sitting which I think is the most I’ve read in a day so far? So as difficult as it may feel I am getting better! 
Words of the day
親代わり - (one acting as a) foster parent
鍛え上げる - to train well, to temper thoroughly
霊薬 - miracle drug
和らぐ - to soften, calm down
持て余す - to be too much (to handle), to find unmanageable, to not know what to do with
足を引っ張る - to hold back (from achieving something), to stand in the way
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January 9
・かがみの孤城. I finished week 7. Now I’ve caught up with the book club as it is currently on week 8. I think I’ll continue reading at my own pace though. Slowing down now doesn’t make sense. Unless I become too busy, that is 
…It’s already past bed time now tho, has been kinda busy today ehehe oopsies
Progress: (38% → 44%)
Spoilery plot stuff
Blurred for extra protecc I know some of yall are reading this book too :3
Ah, I cried ;-; We finally get to know the last “piece of the puzzle” to as for why Kokoro started to stay home from school. The good part from today’s reading is that she seems to feel better around the other girls now and chances are she’ll get along with them from here on c:
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We now have three in our mini よつばと! reading pals club! It’s a party! 
Read (or attempted) to read lots-o-Japanese today, and it’s slow going but lots of fun! Hoping to read more before bed tonight 
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I will change the profile picture in one or two weeks once people are used to the name change.
夏葉 of course, it’s from a visual novel.
Speaking of visual novels there is still a sale on the japanese Nintendo e-shop which has some visual novels in it, if people here are interested in visual novels.
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ドメスティックな彼女 volume 1
I read 15 pages it has lots of words or expressions I didn’t know, which I will put into my anki deck.
たった今 たったいま just now; a moment ago; this very minute
成り行き なりゆき development; outcome; result
馴れ初め なれそめ start of a romance; beginning of love
合意 ごうい consent; mutual understanding N1
何となく なんとなく for some reason or another; without knowing why N2
下種 げす low-life
井戸端会議 いどばたかいぎ idle gossip
チャラ男 チャラお shallow playboy; frivolous lad
給え たまえ please do N2 grammar point masu Stem + たまえ
金田一耕助ファイル２
Just one page I didn’t have time to read more of it.
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Ooh, I might take a look at that, thanks! Though I feel like at this stage I have to have text hooking so it’s hard to move off the PC.
I’ve been curious about trying this game, so I’ll definitely be watching for your thoughts on it!
Ace Attorney: An hour and 40 minutes today, almost finished the investigation phase, but not quite. A little over 2 days (at an average of ~90 minutes) to finish a segment like this isn’t so bad I think. Either way, I’m learning. There are a few sections dense with the sort of specialized words I wouldn’t know like oxygen deprivation, but overall, Ace Attorney is chill. Since I like to attach an image for fun, well, you just can’t do better than this line:
My favorite new word is definitely 月並み （つきなみ), which can mean “every month,” but has a secondary meaning of “trite; commonplace; conventional; hackneyed.” If Jisho can be trusted, this was " orig. used as an insult towards old-fashioned poets who would meet monthly to write poetry." I don’t have the knowledge needed to make any sense of that, but it’s amusing.
Zoo 1: I’ve read a few pages. Certain words are getting repeated so much that they’re drilling into my head, but as I mentioned before, it’s a story more loaded with descriptive words for environments and now actions, which is a little more challenging. I’m finding my book reading stamina really low, but I think I’m just tired these days. It’s so dark outside all day; winter is never fun. Hard to drag myself out of bed, and hard to feel like I’ve ever truly woken up after I do. Still, however much I manage, I’m still doing it.
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Sure playing on pc is more convenient. I just mentioned it here because people on this forum sometimes ask, where to buy visual novels.
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Day 9!
I finished reading the first volume of 極主夫道.
(Big thanks to @MaraVos for their help with the vocab sheet, it was a big help!)
I enjoyed this manga so much more than I expected to. I’m quite tempted to buy the next volume, but I know I should probably read some of the stuff I already have first 
I also did a little bit of reading with one of my tutors today. It was an article full of “Would you rather…” questions. Things like “Would you rather know when you are going to die, or how you are going to die?” and “Would you rather be given £100, or 100 lottery tickets?”
It contained a lot of new vocabulary, so he was helping me to read each question, and then we compared our answers. It was a lot of fun 
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This weekend I treated myself by playing a whole lot of ときめきメモリアル GS(Girls Side) 4! This game is so addictive and fun haha. And while it does seem less like serious work than a novel, it’s still a lot of reading! Lots of everyday vocab that is repeated fairly often too which is good for learning (repeated more often if you are like me and have replayed the first year about 4 times so far, because the stats system is deceptively tricky to get the hang of.) and also your character writes short articles in the game which you can then read. For anyone who doesn’t know the tokimeki series, it’s essentially a high school simulation game, where you are a high school student and you study and take part in school activities and date people. This one is the girls side series, so the MC is a girl and you are dating guys. This play through, I’m trying to win over the lil cute button below, who is adorable and has also encouraged me to do a lot of googling of kansai-ben to figure out what the hell he is saying sometimes lol (the screenshot below isn’t a good example of this but there’s been a few screens where it’s taken me some deciphering.)
But disaster (one more pic below)
His older brother has just been introduced who might be even more cute 
This game is evil! I get the feeling I will be doing many playthroughs to ‘collect them all’ 
some fun vocab/expressions from the weekends ときめきーing
月とスッポン ー two things that are superficially similar but completely different - literally ‘the moon and a turtle’
文武両道 (ぶんぶりりょうどう）- being accomplished both academically and in sports
おおきに ー (kansai ben) thanks a lot
Also found this site which I think I’ll be needing a lot: [http://www.kansaiben.com/] (http://www.kansaiben.com/)
Right! I should already be asleep, this game is too addictive! Happy reading everyone!
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I was thinking this when you mentioned it before, but that’s awesome that you’re playing Tokimeki games. I got curious about the series when Tim Rogers made this ridiculously lengthy video on it… didn’t come anywhere close to watching the whole thing because it’s 6 hours long, but what I did see intrigued me. Glad you’re enjoying it!
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Haha yes, that’s where I heard of it too! I have a friend that is slightly obsessed with Tim Rogers who put on the start of it when we were hanging out. I don’t think I got through the whole thing either but I remembered him saying that he thought that an early dragon quest game (I forget which) was best for beginners of Japanese and that the tokimeki memorial series was his pick for intermediate learners. So when I heard there was a new one coming out for switch I was excited to play it and it’s so far living up to being fun and also feeling very useful Japanese wise!
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Day 8:
日本語: I read some of 伯爵と妖精 30.
中国語
中国語: I read an intermediate entry on Mandarin Bean and one page of 擅长捉弄的高木同学.
Yesterday was a day of pushing on studying, so I spent more time looking at language textbooks than reading. Still, that work will make it easier for me to read later, so hooray.
And: first complete week done!
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Depending on the type of dye used, black can wash out with repeated washings or fade to a lighter colour. It could also be the type of fabric used to make the clothes that can’t hold the dye that was used for black. TMII am actually wearing underwear that has faded to a sort of brown-ish tinge right now.
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Today I read chapter 2 of 蓮住荘のさんかく volume 1.
Picture of 蓮住荘のさんかく
It’s a very cute and easy manga, definitely nice to wind down with after a long day!
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Today I read twenty-two pages of manga from the magazine, ちゃお. It went a lot faster because I’ve been practicing writing out Katakana.
無礼講------ぶれいこう------no-holds-barred party; free and easy gathering
告白------こくはく------professing one’s feelings (to someone one wants to go out with); declaration of love (This is the secondary meaning).
I found it interesting that the primary meaning of 告白 is “confession (to a crime, wrongdoing, etc.); admission”.
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