IronMike's 2023 log: Fewer means better, right? (EO & RUS)

[IronMike]

365-day challenge: Week eleven report.

11.03: Pimsleur lesson 5. Skipped tonight's class as our son is in town from university. (No worries...I'm ahead of the class.)
12.03: Finished 2nd (3rd?) round through lesson 5 Pimsleur. Did exercises for Lesson 4 of Living Italian.
13.03: Lesson 6 Pimsleur.
14.03: Another go through of Lesson 6.
15.03: Lesson 5 of Living Italian. Finally coming across some vocabulary that I'm hearing in Pimsleur, like il viale and la via.
16.03: Exercises for lesson 5 in Living Italian. Did pretty well. Also read through some of the "Articles" chapter in Italian Verbs & Essentials of Grammar. Had to take il ragazzo to the airport.
17.03: Started on Kroata Milita Noktlibro (Croatian War Journal) for the Esperanto Sumoo that started today. Nice to be reading Esperanto again. I'll be able to finish the book during the next 15 days. Will read it to/from work on the train. Also read some more in the "Articles" chapter for Italian.

[IronMike]

Well, it's official. I've signed up for my first Esperanto congress. It's the US and Canadian annual Congress and it is here in Boston! Ready to meet the fellow kooks!

[IronMike]

365-day challenge: Week twelve report. Somehow I forgot totally to publish this yesterday.

18.03: Did some of lesson 1 in Living Language Italian at work, Quizlet vocab review and lesson 5 in Italian for Reading Knowledge. Pimsleur walking to class, then class for 90 minutes. Also read 20 pages in Kroata Milita Noktlibro. And of course Pimsleur lesson 6 to train in the morning.
19.03: Pimsleur lesson 6 and start of Pimsleur lesson 7. Read more in Noktlibro.
20.03: Pimsleur 7. Gonna repeat this one tomorrow! Also, many pages in Noktlibro.
21.03: Pimsleur 7 again. And another chapter in Noktlibro.
22.03: Finished the second round of Pimsleur 7 and started 8. Noktlibro.
23.03: Finished Pimselur 8 and started it over again. Lesson 6 in Italian for Reading Knowledge. Some more pages in Noktlibro.
24.03: Noktlibro (will probably finish it on Tuesday or Wednesday) and Pimsleur 8. Read some more in the Italian Verbs & Essentials of Grammar chapter on articles.

[IronMike]

Holy crap. Just finished lesson 9 of Pimsleur and I gotta say: Dude, catch the hint. She doesn't want to get a drink with you! Not at 1 o'clock. Not at 2. Not at 8 or 9. Stop bugging her!

[Deinonysus]

Holy crap. Just finished lesson 9 of Pimsleur and I gotta say: Dude, catch the hint. She doesn't want to get a drink with you! Not at 1 o'clock. Not at 2. Not at 8 or 9. Stop bugging her!

They got rid of the sexual harassment lesson sometime in the 2000s I think. It's pretty cringy.

[zenmonkey]

Holy crap. Just finished lesson 9 of Pimsleur and I gotta say: Dude, catch the hint. She doesn't want to get a drink with you! Not at 1 o'clock. Not at 2. Not at 8 or 9. Stop bugging her!

No kidding. Ugh. It left a bad taste in my mouth for a bunch of others lessons. It's an embarrassing lesson.

[IronMike]

365-day challenge: Week thirteen report.

25.03: Class tonight. Plus Pimsleur 8 again and started Pimsleur 9. Another bunch of pages of Noktlibro.
26.03: Pimsleur 9. (Dude, she's not into you. Move on.) Almost done with Noktlibro. Finally able to do lesson 2 of Easy Italian Reader due to my vocab getting better. Hurray!
27.03: Finished Noktlibro, Pimsleur 9 one more time.
28.03: Lesson 10 Pimsleur. Read some in Fundamenta Krestomatio.
29.03: Lesson 10 Pimsleur, more in FK, and chapter 3 in Easy Italian Reader.
30.03: FK and some articles in various Eo magazines.
31.03: Finished the Articles chapter in Italian Verbs & Essentials of Grammar and more Eo magazine articles; la marta Sumoo finigxis.

[IronMike]

So this'll be a combo post: Me bragging on my daughter and talking about languages.

This one just completed US Army basic combat training.



Just had the best two days of my life. 3 April was Family Day, and I got to spend the day with her on post. Her brother and his g/f joined us at about 3pm (um, I mean, 1500) so it was a nice mini family reunion.

This is how she and her closest 504 friends entered the field on Family Day. (Fast fwd to 1:00)



Graduation was the next day. The battalion commander remarked on the demographics of the new soldiers:

Of the 505 new soldiers on the field today, 22 of them have associates degrees, 60 have bachelors, 8 have masters degrees and one has a doctorate degree...They come from 47 states and 31 different countries and speak 38 languages.

Quite a diverse group. I myself heard Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole and Russian just walking on the field to find my daughter after the graduation ceremony. Wish I could have sought out the 30+ more!

[IronMike]

Another good week as far as the 365 challenge is concerned. I'm going away from the day-by-day run-down. Found I spent too much time keeping up with that, time I could have spent studying. Suffice it to say this 30-minutes minimum per day thing has become habit, which I'm glad about. I've even branched out a bit, including reading some Американские Боги on the plane to South Carolina. (Been a while since I've read any Russian.)

Italian is going well. Skipped class Monday night as it was our youngest's birthday on Tuesday. (How in the world is she 16 already?) Since I was leaving Tuesday morning for her sister's Army basic grad, I wanted to be home Monday night so she could open presents and we could do cake & ice cream. Can't believe we only have one kid at home now. It's so damn quiet. My wife keeps telling me it's the natural progression of life. I hate it. I know she does too.

Anyway, back to Italian. My reading in Italian Verbs & Essentials of Grammar is paralleling nicely with my progress in Italian for Reading Knowledge. In both I'm now working on possessive adjectives and pronouns (chapter 18 and lesson 6, respectively). I'm going to look for some Italian series to start watching with subtitles. Not quite ready for prime time yet, but would like to get my ears used to more actual Italian instead of just Pimsleur and classroom italiano. Any recommendations? I've got Netflix, Amazon and Hulu.

[StringerBell]

As far as I've seen, all Netflix originals have Italian audio available, so if you watched something you liked in English, you can rewatch it in Italian now.

If you're just looking for a show to learn everyday conversational Italian, That 70s Shows is a good option; Netflix has Italian audio for that. Unfortunately, Italian subs never match up with the audio, but you can use the English subs if you can't follow what's going on.