Radioclare's 2022 log (Russian, Croatian)

[Radioclare]

I don't deserve much sympathy re the coffee machine; it only stopped working because I'm a bad coffee machine owner and hadn't run the de-calc process during the entire year I've had it

I have to ask - what does it mean to "de-calc" a coffee machine? I've never done this - or even heard of anyone doing it. I'm intrigued!

Perhaps the proper word is "descale"? It's to get rid of any limescale that has built up inside it the machine, but how often you need to do it probably depends on how hard your water is. My coffee machine has a little light with "calc" written under it and (as I learned this week!) when it starts flashing, you need to buy some special tablets to dissolve in water and run through the machine. I'm assuming the tablets have something acidic in them and they dissolve the limescale.

[Radioclare]

28 January
Today was payday, which is always a good day I actually didn't think I was getting paid until Monday, so it was a particularly good day when I found out I'd been paid this evening instead!

Russian
It feels like a bit of a long week though and my motivation was low this evening. The Memrise reviews weren't too bad - well, 14 minutes, which isn't too bad by recent standards - but I didn't feel like doing anything else too strenuous. I started reading Код да Винчи though and unexpectedly managed to keep reading it for an entire hour The storyline is definitely getting more exciting now. Some of the words I looked up included "топот" (footsteps - I think loud ones - one of the translations I saw suggested was "stomp"), "полотно" (a canvas, of the sort you paint on, in the context used in this book) and "вкопанный" (standing still, rooted to the spot).

Total - Russian: 83 mins, Croatian: 56 mins

[Radioclare]

29 January
I had a productive start to the morning with a fast walk on the treadmill. Then this afternoon I started doing some travel planning which I thought would take an hour or two... but it ended up taking more like five and now I've failed to do all the other things which were on my list for today

Russian
Before I got distracted with all that I did some housework, clearing my Memrise reviews while I was waiting for the mopped floors to dry. I read in Russian while I was eating lunch, getting through another 25 pages of 'Код да Винчи' today. I looked up loads of words and now I can't remember what they all were I was very glad I'd looked up "полотно" the day before though because that cropped up multiple times again today.

I went for a walk after lunch and then came back and forced myself to open my Russian grammar book. Honestly, I don't know why I've been procrastinating this for over a week because I'm not even in a particularly difficult section. Today's topic was about the use of the accusative and it was nothing particularly earth-shattering; the Russian accusative does pretty much the same thing as the accusative in other languages. It might be a stretch to say I enjoyed it, but once I opened the grammar book it really wasn't that bad so then I felt a bit stupid for having avoided it for so many days

Croatian
I was very excited yesterday evening because I found there's now a Croatian version of Wordle - https://kveez.com/hr/rijecek/. The website itself is horrible (or, at least, doesn't seem to work properly in my browser) but I was pretty impressed with myself when I managed to guess the word yesterday. Tried it again today and failed completely But think it's a fun thing to try in your target language

Total - Russian: 103 mins, Croatian: 51 mins

[Radioclare]

30 January
I got caught up in travel planning again today. I've got flights to various islands in the Azores booked for September; it was a trip I had planned for June 2020 and I've had to rebook it to use up all the vouchers I acquired the first time it was cancelled. I was planning to leave booking accommodation until nearer the time, i.e. to a time when I could be more certain that the trip was going to go ahead, but when I started casually looking at it today I realised places were getting really booked up already. So I spent a lot of time trying to make (cancellable and refundable!) bookings.

Russian
I did my Memrise on the computer today in an attempt to be virtuous. Otherwise just a bit more reading and one more episode of 'Фронт'. It is getting so confusing now that I can hardly follow it. One person who I thought was working for the Germans isn't working for the Germans. And a person who I thought was supposed to be a good guy now does seem to be working for the Germans. I learned some new words: "зеленщик" (greengrocer) and "русалка" (mermaid).

Total - Russian: 91 mins, Croatian: 59 mins

[Radioclare]

31 January
Yay, we've reached the end of January! January is definitely my least favourite month of the year, so this is good news

Russian
I felt like my motivation was lacking a bit last week, so I've decided to try a bit harder this week. I cleared my Memrise reviews, then spent about 45 minutes reading. Today's new vocabulary was a bit random: "ягодицы" (buttocks) and "тамплиер" (Templar, as in Knights Templar).

I bit the bullet and opened my grammar book. I had studied the section on uses of the accusative at the weekend but I hadn't actually done the exercises, so I tackled those this evening. They were pretty straightforward, practising things like using the accusative to indicate the duration of a period of time, which is pretty similar to how it's used in Esperanto.

Spotify told me earlier that there was a new Russian Progress podcast, so I listened to that. So, so much easier to understand than any of the Russian series I've been watching

Croatian
The current storyline in 'Najbolje godine' is that the entire village becomes violently ill every time one of the characters wears a particular (cursed?) necklace, but as soon as she takes it off everyone feels 100% better again Honestly, even by the standard of Croatian telenovela storylines this seems far-fetched!

I haven't been keeping up with watching 'Dnevnik' recently so I made an effort to watch an episode this evening. It's so much more international than the typical UK news. Today's bulletin had mention of general news and/or the Covid situation in Japan, Canada, Poland... They also briefly interviewed a Russian lady who had come to Croatia to get vaccinated.

I also spent 20 minutes or so with the textbook 'Hrvatska na prvi pogled', which was sufficient for me to finish the section on the Croatian economy and with it the entire chapter on Croatian geography. The next chapter is about history, which I reckon might be more exciting and have less difficult vocab than the geography

Total - Russian: 84 mins, Croatian: 75 mins

I am tentatively signing up to the 6WC with Russian. Well, I am signing up to it because I feel like I could use a bit of extra motivation. But I'm going to drop out of it if I find that having to log into Twitter to post my time has more of an overall negative impact on me than not doing the challenge at all

[Radioclare]

1 February
I'm not sure I had a very productive day at work but I did have quite a productive evening for languages. I guess the extra motivation of the 6WC is helping a bit, at least for today

Russian
I did a little bit of Memrise after work, then read for half an hour or so. Today's new words included "ковчег" (ark, as in Noah) and "передача" (in this context, gears of a car).

I did a little bit more work with 'A Comprehensive Russian Grammar', making notes on some of the uses of the genitive (there are many!). And finally, watched episode 7 of 'Фронт'. I've given up now and am fully embracing the subtitles; without them, I don't think I stand any chance of understanding who is double-crossing who.

Croatian
Watched another episode of 'Najbolje godine' on the treadmill this morning and was quite excited to hear the word "kotlina", which was one of the geography-related words I encountered in my textbook earlier this month. It's like a valley with really steep sides and the character in the series was explaining the fact that they had a poor mobile signal by the fact that they were in a "kotlina".

I started the history chapter in the textbook this evening and it is definitely a lot more straightforward than the geography one, perhaps in part because the subject matter is more familiar to me.

I also started reading a new novel in Croatian: 'Štićena osoba' by Pavao Pavličić. I've lost track of how many books by Pavao Pavličić I've read now, but it's definitely a lot This is the only one of his which I have in my 'to read' pile this year so I was initially saving it for some indeterminate time in the future, but after the disappointment of the last book I read in Croatian I decided I wanted to go with something that I knew was going to be good. So far it's off to a strong start I looked up two words which I couldn't guess the meaning of at all: "klimakterij" (menopause) and "šmirgl papir" (sandpaper). It turns out the latter is from German "Schmirgelpapier" so I learned a new word in German too

Total - Russian: 116 mins, Croatian: 134 mins

[Radioclare]

2 February
I was feeling really motivated by the 6WC to have a very productive evening. And then before I got stuck into reading in Russian I made the cardinal error of checking my Esperanto emails and found I had something I urgently needed to reply to. That took up around two hours of my evening and left me feeling extremely grumpy.

Russian
Before dinner I cleared my Memrise reviews and there were quite a lot of them this evening - around 16 minutes' worth.

I was too grumpy to read once I'd dealt with my Esperanto problems, so I decided to watch another episode of 'Фронт' instead. I hadn't realised before I started it that this was the final episode. It was really very exciting, I think a series I should re-watch once my Russian is better

Total - Russian: 75 mins, Croatian: 57 mins

[Radioclare]

3 February
I spent today feeling kinda exhausted. I don't think answering emails about Esperanto finances before bed is conducive to a good night's sleep. At least it's nearly the weekend!

Russian
I did manage to have a more productive evening for languages today. I did my Memrise and read some more of 'Код да Винчи'. I'm over 200 pages in now, which feels like progress. New words included "пандус", which is a sort of ramp. When I google it, the internet is mainly giving me pictures of wheelchair ramps, but in the book it was the sort of ramp you drive down with your car when entering an underground car park.

I did 20 minutes or so of Russian grammar next, with today's subject being the partitive genitive. Fun, fun, fun. I was going to try and find a new series to watch but in the end I was too lazy, so I listened to two Russian Progress podcasts instead. One was about learning Swedish, which I didn't find very exciting, and the other was about what it's like living in a cold place, which was more interesting.

Total - Russian: 108 mins, Croatian: 117 mins

[Radioclare]

4 February
Think I slept a bit better last night so I didn't feel as tired today. And now it's the weekend

Russian
I decided to have a night off grammar in honour of it being Friday. I did some Memrise and then spent 45 minutes reading in Russian, which was enough to get through 25 pages. I looked up quite a lot of words today:

лента - the first definition I got was "ribbon", but in the context of the book it was a belt, like a conveyor belt
шкатулка - casket, some sort of small box
жидкость - liquid, not sure how I've learned Russian for so long without encountering the word for liquid tbh
кобура - holster
уксус - vinegar

Croatian
Really enjoying reading 'Štićena osoba'. I spent another 45 minutes on it this evening and got through 50 pages, so I guess I read twice as quickly in Croatian as in Russian I watched today's Dnevnik, the most exciting bit of which is that they've announced the design of Croatia's coins for when they join the Euro next year. I was slightly surprised to see that one of the coins will feature Nikola Tesla. Not one to debate here, but I can imagine Serbia might not be absolutely thrilled about that.

I'm still watching 'Najbolje godine' but there's a new series called 'Kumovi' starting on Monday, so I think I'm going to give that a go once the episodes start being released.



Total - Russian: 60 mins, Croatian: 116 mins

[Radioclare]

5 February
I spent most of this afternoon trying to sort out things for my potential Azores trip in September. It involves visiting six different islands so I spent several hours sorting out six different car hires. I've already booked and cancelled these six hire cars once in 2020 so I'm really hoping that I don't have to do that again this year. I have a very detailed spreadsheet to track when the last date is to cancel everything I've booked. Nothing an accountant likes more than a holiday spreadsheet

Russian
The good news is that I did all my language learning before I disappeared down that rabbit hole This morning I listened to a couple of podcasts from the BBC podcast 'Что это было?'. The first, 'Нужна ли России большая война с Украиной', I listened to while sorting out some laundry. The second, 'Как Запад ответил Москве и почему Киев не хочет верить в возможность большой войны с Россией', I listened to while cleaning the kitchen a bit later. So both were on the theme of Russia-Ukraine relations, but from different perspectives. This podcast is really above my level, but if it's a theme like this where I already have some basic knowledge then I find I can get quite a lot out of it and enjoy it

Later I did a bit more reading and tackled some exercises on the genitive from 'A Comprehensive Russian Grammar' with about 75% success rate. New words which I looked up today included:

гильза - in the context used in the book, the shell or casing of a bullet
повиноваться - to obey
бронированный - armoured, bullet-proof (as in, an armoured vehicle)

I had to look up that last word because I already knew the verb "бронировать" which is to book or reserve something, but that meaning didn't make any sense in this context.

Total - Russian: 135 mins, Croatian: 92 mins