i’m a tool and i use namecheap lol

honestly i've been wondering when it's gonna take that turn for quite a while. kinda surprised it hasn't yet

If i made a game this fun i would too lol i don't blame him

also this game actually rules lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jib4kj03l8w

lol yeah

i think i'm already tired of the term "metaverse"

My Japanese self-education has been disorganized and spotty lol (thanks ADHD).

Before I started going "I should learn Japanese" in earnest i had probably watched anime for like five years. This helped a bit but English subtitles can be a crutch that prevent you from really diving into learning. Looking stuff you hear up to see what it actually means helps, but full immersion helps more (more on that later). Learning the language as spoken also helps with learning the alphabet.

I started what I'd call actual "study" with duolingo. Duolingo was actually pretty great for helping with the basics! There came a point though where I felt like I was starting to hit a wall, and something about the app/site just wasn't doing it for me anymore. Supplementing Duolingo with other resources gave me a bit more mileage (I'd highly recommend "All About Particles" by Naoko Chino as a reference), but yeah eventually I stopped using it.

Now, I've started a multi-pronged approach focused on immersion. I'm finding it really effective. I guess if it works for a baby it can work for an adult, albeit slower haha.

I'm starting with watching anime or shows I'm familiar with without English subtitles. The point isn't trying to understand everything, but to focus on what you can and pause and look things up when I'm really curious about something. Slice-of-life stuff is particularly good because it contains the most "normal" talking aside from the stuff like anime girls yelling "eeeeeeh!?!?" An added benefit of this approach is it helps a fair bit with making sure your accent is good.

Daily, I'm using the popular Tango N5 (and some day N4) flash cards in Anki. Anki superb free flash card program.

I'm also starting to play games I'm familiar with in japanese. Right now I'm playing Earthbound and Dragon Quest V. Earthbound is actually pretty nice because it contains almost no Kanji. Itoi designed the game so his daughter could play it. For the alphabets I have printouts of hiragana and katakana when I forget any characters. I also keep a text file of notes for each game in the same folder I put the (100% legally acquired) ROM of the game in. This usually includes a table of translated menus in both the english and japanese, and unfmailiar kanji I come across. Tabs are very helpful in this. This is also good practice for using the japanese ime.

The games are very slow going. I've barely gotten through the intro in either, but it still feels very enriching. I also speak pretty much every word aloud as I'm reading it. This helps reinforce both speaking accent and alphabet familiarity for me.

To figure out unfamiliar kanji, I use a OCR screen capture program called "Text Grabber." It's $3.00 on the windows store and absolutely worth the price. You need to make sure you're set to the japanese IME in windows before capturing though. For Kanji that it can't read (no OCR is perfect), jisho.org has a great find-by-radicals tool. And a good find-by-drawing tool. And is just a good dictionary in general.

I'll also start digging into a visual novel at some point, but none have really grabbed my attention.

Anyway that's about where I'm at now. Good luck if you decide to start diving in!

thank you

breakin the law breakin the law

🐍🐍🐍

(this was meant to imply we can be equally cool and epic not that i'm cooler or epicer than you)

this is odd i have a thinkpad E595 (i'm using literally right now) and tbh i think it's the best built laptop i've ever had, excepting maybe my 2012 mackbook pro that lasted nigh on eight years of heavy use

oh yeah?? stands up coolly and epically

i used store brand flour though don't tell the king

i made the cake. it was real good

their flour is pretty damn good too :P

hmmmmmm tempted to make a mug cake now lol

it appears i do not have the means to easily delete an account. i'll see if i can do it in the terminal on the server's machine once i get over a cold

but yeah i do really want it to be five because it's basically my favorite dragon quest

V doesn't at the very least but i'm managing ok without it thanks to jisho's kanji lookup-by-radicals tool

never heard of him. looks like some general video essay guy?

at first i thought you meant "good sick" as a way to emphasize how good it is (e.g. "that's sick bro") lol

if he ever releases any of his alleged 58 novels i'll buy it in a heartbeat lol

i'm watching this now and i'm honestly considering using tokimeki memorial as a way to improve my japanese literacy lmao. and by "now" i mean over the course of this week

I mean this was done in 1996. Taking into account the increase in world population since then, and the fact that our generations might have more eclectic taste; I'd say you're probably one of 800 in the world instead