Well I haven’t responded in the thread for a while now but I’m still following the challenge on the sidelines. I’ve kept reading a chapter per day of 宇崎ちゃん at the very least. I’ve finished the first volume and started the second one. It’s getting easier, less tiring and I’ve adjusted my setup so it helps a lot. I have a lot on my plate overall since the holidays ended but at least I try to carve out 30 minutes every day for it.
Hope everyone is having fun in their own way !
Wasn’t feeling super motivated yesterday so read some シャドーハウス
21/1 25 pages シャドーハウス (finished chapters 58+59)
I’m at the airport now and should be able to read quite a bit on the plane.
January 21st!
Today I finished Chapter 3 of Cells at Work.
I’m still finding it a very difficult read, but watching the anime has helped a lot since it helped me get the hang of some of the vocab, and also made the info boxes that explain things much less intimidating, since I now have a better understanding of the concepts they are explaining.
January 18th-21st 
Home Post 
教養366, 23min.
暁のヨナ for the bookclub, ch. 104, a short (~20min), yet so heartbreaking chapter… cried
missed day 
it was such a long day, got home so late and had extra work to do… just went straight to bed… 教養366, 22min.Yayyyy!!! Thank you so much, I already saw some of the next ones you posted… I cannot resist, they’re too cute 
Thanks for sharing those!
Hi??? Hello Kiro??? nice to meet you??! He looks so fluffy and adorable… thank you for sharing these and gracing us with Kiro pictures! he healed my weary soul!! 
Thank you for you reply!! I’m really sold, I think I’ll try to be bold and I’m going to get the first novel and start with this, it will be an early bday gift to myself lol. I do agree about the art on the covers! I’ve already seen them myself and they look so pretty! 
I gotta say though, if you haven’t tried the manga, the art there is pretty gorgeous too, every single page had my eyes feasting!
１月２１日 (Home Post Link)
Another easy day for reading and busy day irl, but i think tomorrow I’ll be ready to start reading a bit more again. I did get to go to daiso today, and mostly managed to avoid buying anything I didn’t need for the most part.
That is, except for these:
Read:
庇護欲「ひごよく」ー desire to protect
貧血「ひんけつ」ー anemia
仮病「けびょう」ー feigned illness
結び「むすび」ー ending, conclusion
ぐしゃぐしゃ ー messy, untidy
January 21 Home Post
Well today I felt like doing precisely none of the things I have been, so I went completely off course and started playing Genshin Impact? Whoops 
I’m definitely not far enough to have an actual concept of anything but it’s been a good time, I mostly just explored and collected stuff, definite Breath of the Wild vibes so far which I’m always down for! Language-wise it’s pretty okay, I’m going at it with a much more extensive style than I’m typically comfortable with but I think it’s working. The beginning with initial exposition stuff with no context and every item you pick up being new was the roughest, but I think I’m settling into it 
so we shall see!
My last status report was 18 days ago, oops. But I read (almost) every day since then so it’s probably fine.
I said last time that I was gonna finish うずまき in two weeks and I almost achieved it (who cares about 4 days more or less, amiright?). It got kind of repetitive towards the end and I don’t know if I will read volume 2 and 3 as well…
I’m gonna get some physical books in a few days (wanted to read Berserk because everyone recommended it) and I’m looking forward to reading them. In the meantime I might pick up 血の轍 again, who knows.
みんな, good luck with your reading, hope it’s going well for you!
➳ January 22nd.
What: 風のクロノア
Pages: ?
Time: 40 minutes
It’s still going too faaaast, but I am somehow managing to keep up. Despite playing Klonoa 2 way, way too much as a kid, I can’t remember if the text auto advances in that game… Guess we’ll see when I finish the first one. Love the goofy characters in this game… I hope someone’s working on a Klonoa 3 because I want to play it 
Oh my gosh, what a sweet kitty. Thank you for sharing Kiro with us
Ooo! I play Genshin Impact in English every now and then (when I’m not burned out on the gameplay + event loop) but haven’t tried it in Japanese. Interested to know how difficult it is! though there’s no way I’m starting over just to play it in JP… I’ve worked too hard on my team
22nd jan
after dithering over the stuff in my 読みかけ list on bookwalker i went with 四月は君の嘘 cos i’ve got a couple of volumes and i remember the anime being alright (even if it was very 泣きゲー). baffled that kaori’s name is actually spelt かをり. first chapter was very long but not that difficult, just character introductions and stuff. back to 蟲師 tomorrow just in time for the JLPT results to come in 
ohh man i’ve not been to a mr simms in ages! instant nostalgia
1 月 22 日
からかい上手の高木さん Volume 1 Chapter 4 
Halfway through chapter 4, but will probably reread again another day! Little by little getting the hang of recalling the kanji learned from WK that I read in the manga. There’s still more than a handful of moments where I know I should know the meaning and I try to wrack my brain for the answer but it won’t come and I’ll look at it in the vocab list and slap myself on the forehead… 
Home 
January 22nd
ジョジョの奇妙な冒険7
-
ララの結婚
153 - 185
Now I gotta wait for the next volumes to arrive…
Depending on how sleepy and how much time I have after my shower, I might read some JoJo too. I have everything but my clothes ready for work tomorrow, so it’s not like I should need extra time in the morning…
January 22nd
Card Captor Sakura volume 7 / volume 8 – progress report
Yesterday: Read up to page 165, finished chapter 29.
Today: Read up to page 189, finished chapter 30 and volume 7. 
Began reading volume 8, read up to page 20.
Finished volume 7 and continued with volume 8 – only to have another ‘nope, not today’ reaction when liar-kun showed up. So, I stopped at said page.
I hope you get well soon!
It’s great that you managed to read it this time around – congrats! 
Kiro is so adorable! And it’s equally adorable to hear that he missed you so much that he wanted to cuddle even more to make up for the ‘lost’ days. 
The UK pictures are delightful too, btw.
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Word or expression of the day:
一生懸命 - (いっしょうけんめい) - very hard, with utmost effort
Honourable mention(s):
ごまかす - (誤魔化す) - to deceive, to falsify, to cheat ; to dodge, to beg the question; to gloss over
Jan 22, Sun of Week 4 of Winter Q1 2023 
Reunion, of both bad and good.
Only my 2nd day of reading but wanted to share nonetheless. Started going through SKM N2 reading these past two days. It is a jump from N3 for sure, but it being more challenging than the usual manga/articles I read is also motivating me to do WK lessons and reviews. Can’t wait to look back at these first pages and see how far I’ve come 
January 22
Home Post
Orange 
I’m back to Orange, my old friend. The club have now been active for slightly more than 6 months. Feels a bit surreal.
Today was chapter 23 from start to finish. Took me a little bit to get back into the writing style, I haven’t read Orange for a month, but then it flowed well.
I can’t recommend Orange enough. The thing that takes it from being a really good beginner manga is probably the amount of casual language, it is literally everywhere, and those of us who read with the book club so far, already had pretty good grasp on it, so there aren’t really questions and answers about that.
But outside that, Orange is fairly simple. Mostly using everyday, high school vocabulary. With really good characters, a great story, and beautiful art. What more could you ask for? Well, no casual language I guess, but nope, lots of it everywhere. A tiny bit of science fiction, time travel-ly vocabulary, but only crops up 2-3 times across all 5 first volumes, so not much in general. If it sounds interesting, you can check out the club for additional info (such as content warnings).
Unfortunately, we just started volume 6, so you might not be able to catch up with the club itself, but please read it. It is great. ^^ And the threads are available for questions and such, of course.
The Tanuki Kotatsu Reading Den
January 22nd
新書太閣記 progress: 03.37% // Volume I: 39.13% 
Not had much time to read today, but happy year of the BUN!
後手「ごて」ー Losing initiative; being forestalled; second move/going second (Shogi/Go term)
物見「ものみ」ー Sightseeing; scout; patrol; lookout
小勢「こぜい」ー A small force
嶮岨「けんそ」ー Steep terrain; precipitous // (also: 険阻)
Probably some spoilers, but this is a historic novel, so can spoilers really exist for things that have (for the most part) actually happened 
Main
Hideyoshi: 豊臣秀吉「とよとみ ひでよし」
– – – Childhood name: 日吉「ひよし」
– – – Childhood nickname: 猿「さる」
Volume I: 1535 - 15??
日吉「ひよし」- Hideyoshi (as child)
Nickname: 猿「さる」
Family
木下弥右衛門「きのした やえもん」- Father
筑阿弥「ちくあみ」ー Step-father
大政所「おおまんどころ」// also お奈加「おなか」ー Mother
おつみ - Older sister
小竹「こちく」- Baby brother
加藤清正「かとう きよまさ」// also 弾正「だんじょう」- Ojisan (only distantly related (before marriage))
– Married to: おえつ (sister of お奈加)
Friends & Acquaintances
仁王「におう」- Big kid friend
於福「おふく」(Nickname - full name: 福太郎「ふくたろ」) // 楊景福「ようけいふく」(Chinese name/birth name) - Timid kid friend (older than Hideyoshi)
– 五郎大夫 「ごろ だゆう」// 祥瑞「しょうずい」(Chinese name) - Father
– 梨琴「りきん」- Mother
捨次郎「すてじろう」- Previous servant to 五郎, later the adoptive father of 於福, and owner of a tea ware shop - and employer of, and master to, Hideyoshi
Hachisuka Clan
蜂須賀小六「はちすか ころく」(also 正勝 「まさかつ」) - Head of the Hachisuka clan
– Married to 松波「まつなみ」
– – 亀一「かめいち」ー Son
Retainers:
– – 稲田大炊助「いなだ おおいのすけ]
– – 青山新七「あおやま しんしち」
– – 長井半之丞「ながい はんのじょう」
– – 松原内匠「まつばら たくみ」
– 国吉「くによし」ー Gunsmith/blacksmith
– 渡辺天蔵「わたなべ てんぞう」- Deserter - Nobushi (Nephew to Koroku)
Oda Clan
織田信秀「おだ のぶひで」- Daimyo
– 織田与三郎「おだ よさぶろう」- Younger brother
Shiba Clan
斯波義統「しば よしむね」- Head of the Shiba clan, at Kiyosu castle
Others
今川義元「いまがわ よしもと」- Daimyo
阿倍仲麻呂「あべ の なかまろ」ー Japanese scholar & poet (700s)
白楽天「はく きょい」ー Chinese poet (Bai Juyi / Bo Juyi) also known as: 白楽天「はく らくてん」in Japan. (Late 700s)
道元「どうげん」(or 道元禅師「どうげん ぜんじ」ー Japanese Buddhist Priest, writer & poet (also known as 栄西禅師「えいさい ぜんじ」) (Early / mid 1200s)
空海「くうかい」ー The one and only Kukai or Kobo Daishi - a Buddhist monk. Posthumously given the title of: 弘法大師「こうぼう だいし」born as: 佐伯 眞魚「さえき の まお」(late 700s / early 800s)
源頼政「みなもと の よりまさ」ー Prominent poet and warrior (1100s)
Day 20 + 21 Progress: 26-33話 - 四巻完成!!!
The last couple of days have just been kind of a blur of being sick and having to go to work still… despite that I did manage to get more reading done than I expected.
Word of the Day:
Thank you!! I haven’t been able to get in as much R&R as I would like with work and all but I’ll hang in there.
Another week done, kind of.
夜市 is at 51%, so just 9% this week.
I didn’t feel to well for a few days so I did less. I also did not read anything on Friday but that’s okay. I don’t feel too bad about it. I’ve been a lot more consistent than usual so it’s kind of a win already.
And I did read a couple of YT comments, so I technically did read something, but I don’t want to count that.
Finished manga from last week and started reading Spirit Circle. Still in Volume 1 but I hope I’ll finish it after writing this post. done! Some chapters with some old speech stuff is a bit of a slog.
I forgot to thank everyone for their appreciation of the photos. ^^ I will try to catch Kiro when he is being super cute. I might just have to let my phone be glued to me for a couple of days for that though, because if I try moving to get it, he stops to watch me. xD
And since I’m here anyway. I have now also read some fiction in English. ^^
Low key abandoned my own challenge for a couple days for reasons I’ll explain when I’m more coherent/not exhausted, but I just have to say
HE’S GROWN INTO SUCH A HANDSOME LITTLE FLUFFY BEANNN, I love him so much
