📚📚 Read every day challenge - Winter 2023 ☃❄

:bookmark: Home post // Jan 5 :snowman_with_snow: :snowflake:

・ 本好きの下克上 16 (33% → 35%)

Today was a busy day with class/lecture and social gatherings. So just a tiny read today. It was a good day! but I’m also very ready for sleep time.

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January 5 :heavy_check_mark: :zzz:

死体は眠らない, 13-19%

And the plot gets more complicated by the minute. :joy:
I’d have read more, but I spent much of my reading time …looking for more books to read. :sweat_smile:
what’s wrong with me? :eyes:

32 Likes

:books: :snowflake: softlyraining’s snowy book stack :snowboarder: :open_book:

January 5th

:orange_square: ラストで君は「まさか!」と言う 冬の物語 (32% → 40%)

Made it through two stories today, both of which I quite liked! The first one, 裏サンタとユメ, is about an elementary school girl who does a ritual to summon 裏サンタ. From there, she wishes for her comatose brother to wake up. However, only after making this request does she learn the true nature of 裏サンタ: whatever you may wish for, he asks to receive something of equal or greater value in return, including the lives of others. I thought this was a unique concept, and I like that it try and “fix” things for the Yume by the end of it. The story was bittersweet, but I think that makes it stand out more from the rest of the collection.

The second one I read is called 冬のポケット. This one felt more like a literary short story in its approach. The ending’s open to some interpretation, which I think makes it more interesting than some of the more straight-forward stories in the book.

The cover says you can read these stories in 3 minutes, and this whole time I’ve never actually timed how long it takes me. I’ll try timing myself tomorrow, though my guess is it’ll be over 3 minutes.

29 Likes

Jan 5th
Home Post :house_with_garden:

5/1
Hello! Today when I woke up, I read a bit from the Du Chinese app, some 10min.
All good, no unknown words or difficulties!
Also started a manga called 花野井くんと恋の病. First chapter was long, read for about 40min. But it seems like a cute story so far, so I’ll keep reading.
A good day.

Words
  • 理解不能(りかいふのう) = impossible to understand

  • バッサリ= (cutting) with a single stroke;(cutting hair) short

  • 幻滅(げんめつ) = disillusionment

  • 露程(つゆほど) = little bit

  • 縁遠く(えんどおく)= unconnected; far beyond (one’s means, ability)

  • 角煮( かくに) = stew of cubed meat or fish (esp. pork belly or tuna)
    found because of 豚角煮マン which is apparently this, which looks like it needs to get in my stomach :yum:

Also, apologies, but it seems I completely missed about the birthdays! Happy birthday @lucylavelle , @Cathm2 , @Hantsuki and @nyxqueenofshadows :partying_face: :tada: Hope y’all had wonderful birthdays!!!

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2023-01-06T02:22:00Z

Just caught up with all the replies.

Birthday wishes and many returns of the day to @Cathm2 , @Hantsuki , @nyxqueenofshadows and @lucylavelle !

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Summary post

Day 5: January 5th
What did I read?: おでかけ子ザメ2
How much did I read?: 11 pages
How long did it take me?: 10 min

I worked late today and I didn’t have a ton of time, so I thought, why not just read a few pages of the smol shark manga? :joy: In one of the chapters, a guy saw smol shark for the first time and his reaction was a whole entire mood:

For added context, the guy was in the middle of trying to design a new character to represent the neighborhood - luckily for him, the best character ever just walked right up to him :joy:

Cute shark enjoys all the food :pleading_face:

Here's a bonus pic of my reading buddies for this manga...participants of previous challenges may remember them lmao

Also I’m a terrible challenge host and did not wish anyone a happy birthday >< Happy belated birthday to @Cathm2 , @Hantsuki , @nyxqueenofshadows and @lucylavelle ! :birthday::tada:

38 Likes

day 5 :dragon:
home post

Read: Yotsubato! + some song lyrics

Progress: 50/224 → 60/224

Thoughts: Continuing with the trend of not having to look up that many words feels good considering that I consider myself still very beginner at the language. Sure, just reading about Yotsuba and her father waking up and having breakfast is simple, but it’s nice to be able to understand the easy parts~

I also attempted to read some song lyrics today. Sure, I wasn’t able to translate a single line fully, but it felt great being able to understand a piece of it and hear it in the song too.

@MissDagger Thank you for showing me how to do a spoiler! Now I don’t have to talk all vague about what happened.

32 Likes

January 5th
What did I read?: にわにはににん
How much did I read?: 24 pages
(Started & Finished 3rd Story: ワタシのお庭 )
How long did it take me?: 1 hour 50 min

The first time I read a short story in one sitting! :tada: I didn’t really like it. :upside_down_face: It was a mixture of unpleasantness and randomness.

Summary of the story, in case you want to know what kind of unpleasantness and randomness I mean

Basically, it starts off with a couple buying a new house with a garden. Flashforward 5 years, and the wife, Emma, is very into cultivating the garden, while her husband seems pretty aloof to both the garden and his wife. Emma then worsens the shaky relationship she has with her in-laws when she slaps her niece for planting mint in her garden without asking (her issue with it is that mint spreads viciously). Coming to the realization that her husband’s frequent business trips must really be an affair, she falls into depression. She then has a strange dream in which she looks into her garden to see instead a perfectly trimmed lawn with tall walls. In the centre, a giant sphere of leaves and plants hovers, and she happily melts into it, becoming one with the garden. At this point, she wakes up, disappointed that it was just a dream. But she hurries to her garden happily, hoping, I think, to enjoy spending time in it, but instead is greeted with… I don’t really know what, since we don’t get to see, but she says, “Oh my goodness!” and then something smashes?? The glass of the window, I think? I’m guessing the garden became unkempt during her depression, and then she faints, crashing into the window, but who knows. The most interesting part was the little bit of 庭 / には word play there was when she started confusing her identity with the garden.

The next story is the titular にわにはににん, though, and from what little I know of it, I think it will be quite interesting!

26 Likes

1月5日

。*☆ My Home Page 。*☆

What I read:

  • よつばと! v2 p.140-164
  • A short 中国語話 on maayot
Words
  • 田んぼ 「たんぼ」: paddy field, farm
  • 一旦 「いったん」: once, for a short time, briefly
  • 捕る 「とる」: to catch (a wild animal, fish, insect, baseball, etc.)
  • ザリガニ : crayfish (esp. Japanese crayfish)
  • 宜しい 「よろしい」: good, OK, fine

Thank you very much to @Midnightblue , @Voi , and @MissDagger for your replies to my question about word/vocab mining!

Since asking the question and reading your responses, I decided to try continuously reading without stopping to look up words. I think it has made my reading experience better.

Although, I realized it’s fun to see other people’s newly discovered words in this thread. So I decided that for now, after I’ve finished reading a chapter without stopping, I’ll go back to look up just a few unknown words. That way, I can share them with everyone in the thread, too.

When I’m ready to start another book, I want to experiment with pre-learning words from the resources you all mentioned.

Thanks again for your feedback! (And apologies if I missed anyone else’s reply!)

27 Likes

:snowman_with_snow: :snowflake: January 5 :snowflake: :snowman_with_snow:
Home Post

Bustafellows :moneybag:
Finished The Hunter by Richard Stark (English) :books:

Made more strides with BU$TAFELLOWS and I have no idea how much is left of chapter one, but a lot still I think. It is very interesting. :slight_smile:

The Hunter was quite compelling, but with a rather unlikeable protagonist. I didn’t think I’d like it, I learnt some stuff about it before I started, but the author is very, very good.

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January 5 :snowflake: Home Post

I read some more 山猫 today, are you noticing a trend :stuck_out_tongue: I didn’t read as much today, just 34 pages which is still a sizeable amount for sure. I’m officially halfway! :tada: It continues to be very interesting; today’s reading had more sneaking around and such which was fun, 山猫 is certainly good at what he does. He and 勝村 continue to get along interestingly lmao, it’s one of those where they’re clashing and don’t see eye to eye and such but have to work together anyway, and of course they’ll come to understand each other etc. etc. It’s a good trope, can’t be mad :man_shrugging: I am also very curious about the whole さくら and 関本 situation, 関本’s so specifically weird and suspicious in ways I don’t know what to do with :joy: Like it almost feels like they’re implying that he’s working with 山猫 somehow, but that doesn’t make sense with 山猫’s reactions to him I don’t think? Idk, I have more questions by the day, it’s a mystery novel!

(But yeah I just didn’t read as much today; I got distracted by the steam sale, snagged a couple things for future projects, but most importantly I got Slime Rancher 2 and it’s the most delightful game in the world, feels apt for all the cute manga getting thrown around :'))

27 Likes

Home Post

Day 4 Progress:
お隣の天使様 五冊 - 66.97% → 72.28%

Barely made my quota today (I started reading at about 3 AM, lol) and yet somehow I think I might’ve had my fastest paced reading session ever, over 5% in roughly 70 minutes. My pace obviously depends on many factors including the grammar/vocab being used and my own interest in what’s happening, but today was just one of those days where everything clicked and I knew almost all the words and it felt like I was actually reading kinda naturally. Turns out in my case that grinding flashcards mercilessly is actually pretty effective…

Word of the Day: 大味おおあじ - flat-tasting, bland, dull, flat. What the heck happened to this word???

28 Likes

Home post

1 月 6 日
コナの大冒険 第20話 from Satorireader

Accusations have been thrown and リリー shares her thougts. In this episode, I learned two new speaking styles(?) apparently used to make sentences feel feminine. I’m not entirely sure what feminine covers though. Is that strictly only women? Or can it also be used by men more in touch with their feminine side? I suppose in the olden times it would only be women but I wonder in modern times if men can use it now too.

  • わ used at the end of sentences as a feminine ending particle e.g. コナはいいわよ
  • omission of だ at the end of sentences to be more feminine sounding e.g. 幸せ者( だ )ね
Other phrases/words of interest:
  • 人聞き (ひとぎき) if someone were to hear that in satori reader but in my dictionary app it’s reputation - I guess it’s related but not exactly the same…
  • 自然界 (しぜんかい) natural world
  • 紹介 (しょうかい) introduction, presentation, referral
  • 首を縦に振る (くびをたてにふる) to shake your head up and down as a gesture of saying yes
  • 首を横に振る (くびによこにふる) to shake your left and right or side to side as a gesture of saying no - if direction of shaking is omitted apparently it’s more likely no
Reply to @windupbird

Your shark manga and shark buddies are adorable! Maybe your buddies can get along with mine?


Although it’s just pretending… Hahaha

30 Likes

January 6th

:snowman: Home post :snowflake:

Card Captor Sakura volume 5 – progress report
Yesterday: Continued up to page 141, finished chapter 21.
Today: Continued up to page 189, finished chapter 22 and volume 5. :tada:

This chapter was full of foreshadowing. So much so that I can’t shake the feeling that Yue’s reveal and the trial may even begin next volume which is surprising to me that it would happen half way in already but my memory is fuzzy, soo :person_shrugging:. And speaking of my recollection of things happening in the series: I will just mention that I may have another rant coming up after the next few volumes. For now, I’ll just leave it…to simmer. :unamused:

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Word or expression of the day:
関係者 - (かんけいしゃ) - person concerned, people involved (in an event)

Honourable mention(s):
只者 - (ただもの) - ordinary person (usually used in neg. sentences)
おごる - ((奢る)) - to give (someone) a treat / to live luxuriously; to be proud; to be haughty

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:spiral_calendar: Day 5: January 5th :snowflake:

spacer:girl: からかい上手の(元)高木さん Volume 10 (17% ➨ 24%)
spacer:sun_with_face: 夢みる太陽 Volume 2 (41% ➨ 59%)

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home post

jan 6th

finished chapter two of 蟲師 vol 1! in total about 17 pages, so a lot less than yesterday. some of it went quicker, but really struggled with the last resolution-y bit at the end. i think i got it, but i also think the story has a deeper meaning that i’m missing rn thanks to some uh less than complete understanding. ah well, back to it again next week!

it’s here on wk (i’ve not learned it yet) but 溶岩 turned up a few times, which is a fun word

edit: i checked he last couple of panels in an english version online and i was right! i just needed a little space to let it settle in my head

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from personal experience and going purely of off how it appears in media (so take with a grain of salt), this is still used by some women characters, but also by men too. that used to be only ‘effeminate’ or queer-coded men (often with a negative connotation or in some humorous way at the man’s expense), but more recently i’ve heard it from more ‘masculine’ men too so maybe things are changing?

(someone else with more detailed knowledge please correct me)

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I wonder if it’s somehow related to 大人の味 which is more ‘adult’ flavors. Think coffee, less sweet sweets, slightly bitter things, etc.

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:house:
Jan 6

かがみの孤城 13% → 17%

I didn’t post yesterday because I only managed to read one or two pages. Today I procrastinated the entire day and read from 12:30am to 1am :sweat_smile: time to sleep now, let’s see if I can read until 30% through tomorrow.

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Jisho says the opposite is 小味 - Jisho.org which somewhat defeats your speculation, I guess? While I can understand that “fine nuances in taste” would be 小味, I don’t get why “big nuances in taste” should mean “bland” or “dull” :thinking: :woman_shrugging:

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