I got my hair cut today… Pretty drastically, too.
(But I’d been meaning to for a while…)
@QuackingShoe - RIGHT??!!!
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You two need to channel your inner ハルヒ. She made a pretty compelling case for it.
I won’t do it either, plus, Sundays sound crazy.
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My hair can’t hold a ponytail. I’d just be wrapping rubber bands around my head.
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Her explanation is why The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi is my #0 anime in my top 5!
(That way, Sailor Moon gets to stay at #1!)
Also, aforementioned haircut can be seen in the POLL thread, here.
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So, @Naphthalene successfully enjoined me to read the second week’s part, and I finally found some time to dedicate to it… I spent a lot of that time researching (or refreshing my memory of) various grammar constructions. There were more points overall, but none had me thinking as much as the complex sentence with は and missing copula/verb from last part. For those interested, below are a few (grammatical) remarks…
Notes and notations
I’ve rated my confidence in my analysis with ‘?’. No ‘?’ means I’m pretty confident. One ‘?’ means I’m happy with my analysis but welcome other views; two '?'s means I’m not quite convinced; more would be for cases such as last time…
Note: I read from an extracted copy of the e-book and have no idea what page they are from (and my % numbers would be different compared to an e-reader anyway), so I don’t recommend looking unless you’ve already read through, unless you do not care. In case you’re curious, I do that as it’s easier to look up words on my computer; I keep the e-reader for bedside reading—less effective but nicer. 
Do you dream of grammatical sheeps...
「もしあいつに気があるんなら、悪いことは言わん、やめとけ。涼宮が変人だってのは充分理解したろ」
Two interesting things: 悪いことは言わん seems to be from 言わない but embedded directly as kind of set phrase that doesn’t take が or けど or anything. The other is したろ <= したろう = しただろう, the past tentative “you surely did”. It would seem to be dialectal (some sort of Kansai; Osaka?); I previously thought the speech patterns didn’t seem Western, but maybe it’s some light dialect, in which case I should revise my judgement on “old-man speak” from the protagonist as well. Etymologically, I think the main theory is that it comes from old たらむ > たらう > たろう, but it seems some believe it to be contracted from た(だ)ろう instead.
「そ。中学時代にもわけの解らんことを言いながらわけの解らんことを散々やり倒していたな。有名なのが校庭落書き事件」
? やり倒して seems to be やる+たおす, as a colloquial (dialectal?) suffix similar to まくる “do nothing but”. I looked around but couldn’t find an authoritative reference, and it’s not in any dictionary I have; some seemed to think it had an Osaka flavour.
だんまりを決め込んだ涼宮のキッツい目で睨まれてみろ、もうどうしようもないぜ。
? The imperative is a bit puzzling at first, but I guess it is to be interpreted as two separate sentences conjoined with just a comma. “Have Haruhi glare at you like that and …”
ガラゴロ引きずっているラインカーと山積みにしている石灰の袋はあらかじめ体育倉庫からガメていたんだろう
ガラゴロ seems to be a combo of two halves of different mimetic words; reminds me of the beginner’s club current reading, which has a plethora of different mimetics that are sometimes very hard to parse.
「しけてやんなあ」
?? I read this as a contraction of しけてやがるなあ. やる makes no sense, and the characters don’t use the や copula and aren’t speaking in polite speech so polite てや is also out. On the other hand, there is the precedent of expressions such as てやんでえ in Kansai. But not entirely convinced; maybe I’m missing something trivial…
「キョン、高校生にもなって妹のお守りでジジババのご機嫌うかがいに行ってどうすんだ。高校生なら高校生らしいことをだな、」
? I’m not sure how to interpret 妹のお守りで; I think it’s a variant of (子供)のお守りする “to baby-sit”. する => だ conversions in exalting expressions with お are common, so even though this is not respectful speech, it may have bled into it? It makes sense in context, anyway.
「あたし、思うんだけど、曜日によって感じるイメージってそれぞれ異なる気がするのよね」
I think, I’ve seen articles about けど used like this as a kind of topic marker; I haven’t read them, though, so I might be wrong, and this might not be it, but it would make sense IMHO. Anyway, the meaning is clear.
だいたいハルヒは授業中以外に教室にいたためしがないから何か話そうと思うとそれは朝のホームルーム前くらいしか時間がないわけで、たまたま俺がハルヒの前の席にいただけってこともあって何気なく話かけるには絶好のポジションにいたことは否定出来ない。
?? Not sure how to interpret だけってこともあって. Parsing it as だけ って こと も あって seems pretty obvious, but I’m wondering what precise sense to attribute to だけ here. I feel as if it looks like だけあって “precisely because” split with こともあって “also as (there is the matter of)”, but a straight English translation seems awkward to me… “and also precisely because I sat …” maybe? Seems to make sense, but I’m not 100% sure.
腰にまで届こうかと伸ばしていた髪が肩の辺りで切りそろえられていて、それはそれでめちゃくちゃ似合っていたんだが、それにしたって俺が指摘した次に日に短くするってのも短絡的にすぎないか、おい。
I find それにしたって fairly interesting. It seems obvious that it is それにしても, where したって has been substituted, but if Martin is right in thinking that したって comes from して+あって, then the final form would be pretty funny as it would combine two meaningless verbs する and ある, while dropping the meaningful particle も (as in それでも).
あれ以来、ホームルーム前のわずかな時間にハルヒと話すのは日課になりつつあった。
Nothing much to remark except that つつあった is the stative(?) form of the つつ construction (つつある=ている), except you can tell the form is old, because it takes ある to make it stative/continuative and not いる as in ている.
何を基準に学校選びをしているのだろう。
An example of the XをYに construct “with X as/in(to) Y”; there seems to be some debate as to whether it is only an ellipsis of XをYにして, or if it has other usages too.
何をもって変だとか普通だとかを決定するんだ？
An example of the formal をもって, of which we saw the degraded form でもって in the previous part, I believe.
As for the contents, hmm, must say I don’t really like these character archetypes all that much. I’m neutral vis-à-vis the narrator; I found the initial long-winded stream-of-consciousness sentences a bit tedious (stylistically), but he seems to have improved in that department so it’s fine now. However, the main female lead’s “beautiful genius loner übermensch” trope seems to be played too straight for my taste so far…
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しける ー 関西弁 for しらける
やんなあ ー 関西弁 for だよな
So basically the や copula which you noted no-one is using. Maybe it is “imported” 関西弁? Picked up from watching comedians or so.
I feel like this makes the most sense, but at the same time it is inherently contradicting. Akin to saying “Sitting in front of her is also the only reason…”.
Edit: actually, how about interpreting
たまたま俺がハルヒの前の席にいただけ
as “Sometimes just sitting in front of Haruhi”? As in sitting and doing nothing else. So including ってこともあって: “Since him just sitting there also happens…”
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Well how do you explain しけてや though? The only て+や (copula) I know is a polite form in certain dialects but that’s very very unlikely here. Otherwise, it makes no sense for me for the copula to come after て, that’s why I picked やがる instead. 
EDIT: Also, how do you explain ん after や?
Here’s some evidence in your favour: Link
Allegedly, しけてやがるな (accompanied by a tongue click) is something said by yakuza in movies when rifling through someone’s wallet and finding little. Originally from low fishing yields due to storms. So this is the 時化る meaning, “to be stormy”.
By the way, I made an edit regarding the だけってこともあって in my previous post, in case you have not seen that
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About だけってこともあって, after re-reading the sentence, your interpretation makes sense, so maybe I’ll go with that. I also found the opposition of だけ and もあって jarring, and moreover だけあって normally is read as a single unit, so that was a negative for my theory as well. Therefore, I guess yours is more plausible overall.
P.S.: It may all sound like nitpicking since in fine I think we all kind of understood the meaning of the various sentences quite well; it’s all a matter of nuance at this stage, but I appreciate your willingness to indulge in the mental exercise. 
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I’m getting a strong “ ボーっと生きてんじゃねーよ！” feeling from all those discussions. Maybe I should start studying grammar again…
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Well… though I like discussing the grammar and theory, I also posted those remarks because I hope they’ll maybe help some of the less advanced members reading along. I didn’t mean them as a pure exercise in mental flagellation. 
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I don’t think they are at all! I just meant that, when I read, I’m the polar opposite of you and don’t pause and think. I just wish I did a bit more of that.
(By the way, the sentence I wrote is the catchphrase of チコちゃん, the main character of a TV variety show that talks about about stuff people just take in strides, e.g., “why are we using slippers?”. Her point is that they should think about/question their surroundings.)
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You’re not the only one… (That all seems so above my head, it makes me worry about this week’s reading - which I haven’t even looked at yet…)
EDIT: Seeing your post directly above this, I think I too took it the wrong way. XD
And I would read quite faster if I were more like you. 
But don’t hesitate to comment on my understanding of the various points if you want!
Oh I thought it must be some kind of reference but it was indeed eluding me.
Errr… Maybe I shouldn’t post those remarks if all it does is frighten people. 
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Please keep it up! I’m learning a lot form these discussions, even if (or rather, because) they’re sometimes above my level!
I’m sure I’m not the only one, either, seeing as others also expressed similar sentiments before.
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No, I just need to study grammar… And when I see things like that, remind myself how little I have. ^^;
Sorry to worry you.
(Seeing it late at night with 0 brain power doesn’t help matters, either.)
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Finally made it. Jeez.
I think I’m struggling with this book quite a bit actually. I’m fine reading it, but it’s much more of a mental exercise than any other book I’m reading/have read.
I’m with @Carvs on the character archetypes, I’m not really a fan and I’m also not too much into the writing style, but it’s challenging and I don’t like quitting, so I’m sticking with it.
Also, @Carvs, while I may not be able to keep up with your grammar contemplations and discussions 100% (they’re like, way above my grammar level), I do enjoy reading them and I learn a little bit of something every time, so by all means, keep it up 
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If it helps, there’s a bit more to Haruhi (the character), and the character archetypes are… how to put it. Extremely intentional?
Haruhi is sort of about light novels and anime. And… well, it’s difficult to say much without spoiling anything. But suffice to say, there are cliches, but the cliches are intentionally invoked and played with.
Light novels and anime about light novels and anime became sort of a low-hanging trend after this came out, but most of them are pretty poor quality with little to say.
Doesn’t mean either of you will end up liking this one either though.
Anyway, I might compare it to Ouran, but where Ouran looks at Shoujo manga archetypes and deconstructs them a little, Haruhi looks more at anime in general.
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Haha yeah I can definitely see how it’s just a good exercise and having the book club to back you up makes it fun even though you don’t really like the characters all that much or something. As you can see, I spend a lot more time on the language/grammar study than on the contents, myself.
Anyway, if you or anyone wants to ask something about my remarks, feel free.
@Gyoshi Thinking some more about this だけ issue, I just realised at some point that… we actually have the same problem in English with “just”. “As there is also the fact that I just sit in front of her by chance.” It contrasts the fact that he sits there with other things he could be doing, but the meaning could be anything ranging from “well I might as well speak to her since I just sit here doing nothing else” to “it is precisely because I am sitting here”. 
@QuackingShoe Well, I think I’m fine in the sense that I don’t need to love the characters to enjoy the exercise… and I need some reading practice anyway. As you say, it might become more of a deconstruction later on (which might be a good or a bad thing, depending on how it’s handled ), we’ll see, but it doesn’t particularly bother me either way; I was just stating a not-very-strong opinion.
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While I don’t necessarily find the characters all that likable (looking at you 谷口 ), I do find them interesting and well written.
I see Haruhi as immature in her thinking, but I gotta give her respect on how actively she approaches things. Take how she went around to all the clubs to take part in their activities for a day. When I think of what a lazy, introverted bastard I was back in high school, that is simply impressive.
キョン acts as deliberate counterpoint to Haruhi, harboring very similar wishes about 超能力者や未来人や（r, but with an established jaded view. キョンs bookish way of talking also introduces an eccentrism indicating something more to his character that removes him from your typical LN protag with 普通が一番 as their motto.
Not trying to convince anyone that they are good characters per se, but there was my 2ゼニ.
I disagree. As I see it, the order completely removes any ambiguity. “Just because I sit” vs “Because I just sit”… is what I thought, but yeah. “Just sitting caused it.” is completely ambiguous.
Edit: In the sentence above, though, I feel like maybe the ってこと (always?) serves as a clear ending of the preceding clause.
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