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lydamorehouse I'm NOT the best Duolingo user.
I don't always respond to guilt-trips, so their "Hey, you know you can only learn by constant practicing!" reminders get ignored by me nine times out of ten. They are also pushing me to learn new words/units, but I keep circling back to previous ones because f*ck if I can remember the kanji for 'inu' from one day to the next.
Obviously, I'm not supposed to be using Duolingo as my sole source of language study, and, yet, I sort of am.
I mean, I legitimately have flashcards at home, but do I use them? I bought a subscription to Japanpod101.com, but do I listen to a lesson every day, like I should? I have Pimsler CDs in my car, but do I pop one in the player instead of listening to news that makes me want to pull my hair out?
No.
Also, if you can't tell from the above, I am a 100% auditory learner (thank you, mild dyslexia), which may be another part of my general problem with Duolingo. However, I do need to be able to read/sound out words in Hiragana, and Duolingo is the ONLY way I have learned any of that consistently. So, for that, Duolingo has been good.
Probably what I need is a routine. I should have some set time, every day, where I sit down and do ten minutes of study there and follow that up by listening to a podcast and make Mason do flashcards with me. My brain resists foreign languages though, I swear.
Anyway, that's just me complaining. I know what I need to do. I'm just lazy. And, it's not like I have some kind of deadline. I'm learning Japanese just because I want to. There is no trip planned for the future. I'm sure that's a big part of why I haven't managed to actively carve out space for study.
Today, I'm going to go to the coffee shop and hang out with a bunch of my writer friends. My friend Eleanor has been trying to get me to commit to another day during the week (Mondays?) where we get together and actually write, since Fridays have become more about socialization than actual writing. It's a good idea. I have a project I need to start working on, as I got a invite to an apocalypse themed anthology. It's a small press deal, but an invite is still an invite, so I'll take it. My deadline is April 2019.
I've been writing a TON of fan fic, but if you're a follower of junko on AO3, you're probably thinking, "No, you haven't, you big fat liar." But, actually I HAVE. I just haven't posted anything yet, because it's a collaborative project with Josey (cestus) that's an Aizen + Ukitake/Kyouraku (Bleach) epic. Unlike me, Josey doesn't like to post WIPs while they are in progress. So, we are waiting for more to be written before we post. She has given me permission to post one of the pieces because it's nearly a standalone in that it tells some of the origin story of how Aizen discovered Kyoka Suigetsu's shikai. But, in the last few days I've been kind of struggling to put word on paper at all, and I have no idea why. Normally, winter is my best writing time.
Last night I went to Tumblr just to see what was happening there. I scrolled quite a ways down my feed, and my personal feed now almost entirely consists of memes about Tumblr's implosion/random explicit tagging policy AND porn bots. Seriously, I hit three porn bots with live-action porn happening right in front of me with all the female presenting nipples being groped in a way I actually don't find very hot, and YET when I go searching on the #yaoi hash tags....
It's possible that all the NSFW yaoi artists and reviewers and text posters decided to go through their entire user history and delete the #yaoi to preserve their work, but somehow I doubt it. I would much rather be able to read someone's review of the latest yaoi post than see an actual, real life dick on my dash, personally--not that I have anything against people who want both (or neither.)
Sigh.
I don't always respond to guilt-trips, so their "Hey, you know you can only learn by constant practicing!" reminders get ignored by me nine times out of ten. They are also pushing me to learn new words/units, but I keep circling back to previous ones because f*ck if I can remember the kanji for 'inu' from one day to the next.
Obviously, I'm not supposed to be using Duolingo as my sole source of language study, and, yet, I sort of am.
I mean, I legitimately have flashcards at home, but do I use them? I bought a subscription to Japanpod101.com, but do I listen to a lesson every day, like I should? I have Pimsler CDs in my car, but do I pop one in the player instead of listening to news that makes me want to pull my hair out?
No.
Also, if you can't tell from the above, I am a 100% auditory learner (thank you, mild dyslexia), which may be another part of my general problem with Duolingo. However, I do need to be able to read/sound out words in Hiragana, and Duolingo is the ONLY way I have learned any of that consistently. So, for that, Duolingo has been good.
Probably what I need is a routine. I should have some set time, every day, where I sit down and do ten minutes of study there and follow that up by listening to a podcast and make Mason do flashcards with me. My brain resists foreign languages though, I swear.
Anyway, that's just me complaining. I know what I need to do. I'm just lazy. And, it's not like I have some kind of deadline. I'm learning Japanese just because I want to. There is no trip planned for the future. I'm sure that's a big part of why I haven't managed to actively carve out space for study.
Today, I'm going to go to the coffee shop and hang out with a bunch of my writer friends. My friend Eleanor has been trying to get me to commit to another day during the week (Mondays?) where we get together and actually write, since Fridays have become more about socialization than actual writing. It's a good idea. I have a project I need to start working on, as I got a invite to an apocalypse themed anthology. It's a small press deal, but an invite is still an invite, so I'll take it. My deadline is April 2019.
I've been writing a TON of fan fic, but if you're a follower of junko on AO3, you're probably thinking, "No, you haven't, you big fat liar." But, actually I HAVE. I just haven't posted anything yet, because it's a collaborative project with Josey (cestus) that's an Aizen + Ukitake/Kyouraku (Bleach) epic. Unlike me, Josey doesn't like to post WIPs while they are in progress. So, we are waiting for more to be written before we post. She has given me permission to post one of the pieces because it's nearly a standalone in that it tells some of the origin story of how Aizen discovered Kyoka Suigetsu's shikai. But, in the last few days I've been kind of struggling to put word on paper at all, and I have no idea why. Normally, winter is my best writing time.
Last night I went to Tumblr just to see what was happening there. I scrolled quite a ways down my feed, and my personal feed now almost entirely consists of memes about Tumblr's implosion/random explicit tagging policy AND porn bots. Seriously, I hit three porn bots with live-action porn happening right in front of me with all the female presenting nipples being groped in a way I actually don't find very hot, and YET when I go searching on the #yaoi hash tags....
It's possible that all the NSFW yaoi artists and reviewers and text posters decided to go through their entire user history and delete the #yaoi to preserve their work, but somehow I doubt it. I would much rather be able to read someone's review of the latest yaoi post than see an actual, real life dick on my dash, personally--not that I have anything against people who want both (or neither.)
Sigh.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-07 10:32 pm (UTC)I'm just glad I deleted my Tumblr a few weeks before the purge, not that it would've bothered me if they had deleted it anyway.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-07 11:03 pm (UTC)As I said, it's kind of a shame? I did have to put up with a lot of porn bots on that tag and 7/10ths of the stuff on the yaoi hashtag was absolutely explicit and NSFW, but it was also where I found stuff I wanted to read next. Manga is so visual a medium, it was kind of nice to get a sense of the art I'd be consuming as well as the story.
Ah well.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-08 04:27 am (UTC)I've always really been curious though how dyslexia manifests with hiragana/Japanese. Especially since sentences don't have spaces, it seems like it'd be very difficult to find where words begin and end.
The whole tag purging thing is really disappointing. The fact that they're getting rid of yaoi and yet can't even wrangle the actual porn is...ugh. All NSFW content is not created equal. But also, screw you, Apple, for putting Tumblr between a rock and a hard place.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-08 05:02 pm (UTC)I mean, like all otaku, the DREAM would be to be able to read manga in the raw/native format, but that's a DREAM and not likely (for me) a long, long time. Mostly, I'd liked to be able to listen and understand. So, with that goal in mind, dyslexia doesn't much get in the way.
I was proud of myself for throwing a Pimsleur CD in the car this morning while I was doing some Saturday morning errands. I was especially pleased because I mostly remembered the vocabulary.
And, yeah, I went down my Tumblr feed again yesterday. There are people hanging on, but it's kind of becoming a ghost town.
Hmm ...
Date: 2018-12-08 08:38 pm (UTC)Have you tried watching movies with Japanese soundtracks and English subtitles? Most DVDs have multiple alternate tracks nowadays, and most of those are world languages. Japanese is very common. If you put on a familiar movie, it's fairly easy to follow. Although I will say the original Gojira is very little like Godzilla came to be, and much better.
Another option is to play foreign language overnight. I don't know if it'll work for other people, since humans are said not to absorb sleep-learning well, but it worked for me. For a strongly audio learner it might, and it doesn't require you to exert as much effort as paying attention to language practice.
Re: Hmm ...
Date: 2018-12-08 11:28 pm (UTC)I watch a lot of anime with subtitles, so I am getting a little of that.
I'm not sure how my wife would feel about overnight stuff, but I have been known to doze off to some of the podcast on Japanesepod.101. So, maybe that will help?
I did remember to listen to my Pimsluer CDs in the car today, so... you know, little by little!
Re: Hmm ...
Date: 2018-12-08 11:35 pm (UTC)Glad I could help.
>> I watch a lot of anime with subtitles, so I am getting a little of that. <<
*chuckle* When I first discovered anime, none of it was translated. We watched for the art and guessed at the plots.
>> I'm not sure how my wife would feel about overnight stuff, but I have been known to doze off to some of the podcast on Japanesepod.101. So, maybe that will help?<<
That should work.
>>I did remember to listen to my Pimsluer CDs in the car today, so... you know, little by little!<<
Go you!
I used to run a Spanish radio station on the ride to school sometimes. The key to background sound studying is to throw it on when you're NOT paying attention, so your subconscious can absorb the sounds and rhythm of the language.