idk what, but probably Czech again (back after a long hiatus)

[Via Diva]

I guess, this was unavoidable.


I am not satisfied with that. But I was awake before 6 AM, and it's past midnight. I won't be harsh on myself :)
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Lost thread while L-Ring multiple times. Can't say whether these are faults of translations (don't forget that I use the official Russian trasnlation, which I am not a big fan of). Gotta activate the learned vocabulary. And study some grammar. Most probably not tomorrow, though. Eh, if only I wasn't so lazy.
Almost no German. Die Sprache lebt aber noch.

[Via Diva]

Week one is over, time to sum some things up:
+ I got a bit familiar with Czech
+ I have stuff to listen to
+ I regularly L-R Harry Potter and learn words in Memrise
But:
- I don't know any grammar
- I am still not sure about the pronunciation and the like (ř!!!)
Some fancy data:
Total 6WC stats

Songs

Tags (including what I've done today so far)

[Via Diva]

So I gave up and decided to do some more or less formal studies - with the speakASAP course. Of course they are not ideal, but nothing is ever ideal, and their methods do work. I would even go for their 30 days language marathon, but they promise only A1 (do you remember my crazy ambitions? xD) and I don't think I should pay 50 Euro for something I can do on my own.
Well, not on my own, with your help too :)
Anyway, that's what the first lesson was about:

The problems/questions are, as following:
1) mixing up jsme and jsem
2) do people mostly say sem instead of jsem, sou instead of jsou and so on?
3) what's the difference between připravení and hotoví?
4) why are singular forms used with formal you? (jste vdaná, jste ženatý)

Apart from that I listened to some radio (Český rozhlas Plus) today, nearly died from laughter (there was a woman with literally cartoonish voice! Like Czech isn't funny enough without it). My phone is set up in Czech now, and I guess smazat isn't the funniest false friend I am going to encounter there :)
And I L-R Herr aller Dinge again, it's gotten really interesting. This book is huge, though, I wonder when I'll be done, hehe.

Oh, I really don't know who reads my log on the original HTLAL, but thank you for going over 60000 views ^^

[Via Diva]

I have to activate my Memrise vocabulary.
I have to activate my Memrise vocabulary.
I have to...
I have to drink more coffee.
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As I approached the fridge to get some cookies in X time today, I stared at the table that has been hanging there over a year now:

I think it's time to find a replacement. Since the 2nd lesson of the speakASAP course is too damn short (so short that I forgot the stuff that was there already, haha), I can look at the lesson three and try to extract these five groups of Czech verbs which are discussed there (let's hope I'll learn the forms of to be and to have without having to hang a table on my fridge).
I am clearly bad at listening comprehension. From today's hour of listening to Český rozhlas Plus a lot of time was dedicated to some religious talk. Usually that rids me of calm and peace, but I was just fine by the end of that conversation. Probably because I didn't get a thing. I generally manage to get a vague idea - for example, that talk was followed by something about Croatia. No miracles, but it would be foolish to hope for something like this, eh?
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I get quite a bit of explanations about Czech grammar, and I am starting to suspect that Czech sometimes mirrors Russian - not in the sense of two things being the same, but the opposite. If I get it right, Czech "a" works like Russian "i", and Russian "a" is Czech "i". Of course it's not as simple as I say, and I have to be much more advanced to really understand what's going on.
Like if that is not enough, do you remember smazat? Well, brace yourself...
mazat = mazat'
smazat - the opposite of smazat'
vymazat - the opposite of vymazat'
namazat (+ idiom meaning of to get drunk) = namazat' (without any idiom meanings)
promazat = promazat' (+ to miss, to hit the wrong spot)
pomazat = pomazat'
umazat ? can be the same as umazat', but frankly I am not sure we even use that often enough
zamazat = zamazat' (+ to cover/ mask something which is usually written)
rozmazat = razmazat' (+ idiom meaning of threat "я тебя по стенке размажу")
On the other hand, ještě works just like the Russian еще. I have got to calm down now xD

[Via Diva]

The replacement is already in its place with all the magnets used to keep it hanging:

I knew I won't sit through this third lesson. I didn't expect to give up so fast though:

There are 6 exercises like this, and even though I know for a fact that they work, I just can't deal with it. I expected Swype on my phone to help me a lot, but its dictionary doesn't even have mlčet! It's bloody exhausting to type all the diacritics there otherwise. I already read about the wonderful Czech keyboard layout, probably I just have to install it here on the laptop and silently hope that the Swype dictionary will be expanded one day, or that I won't have to type much from my phone. But I probably will have to, if Czech gets serious one day (aka if I won't drop it shortly after this 6WC is over). I am kind of glad that Russian wasn't Latinized during the last century, because all the projects had excessive diacritics, which now looks like pure evil to me. Of course it saves space. But then we need better keyboards...

L-Ring Herr aller DInge still.

For two days I was forgetting to mention that I noticed this Greek course on the speakASAP site. This is exactly what I needed... last June. Right now I can't afford anymore wanderlust. Yesterday I had to skim through my whole log on the original HTLAL, and while I was doing that I found this:

Couldn't sleep because insomnia, so I had to think about stuff to pass the time, and I thought about languages (surprise, surprise!) and I've come to think that my goals are somewhat unrealistic. These seven languages (I include English) aren't all the languages that I would like to learn, I sort of wander between Finnish and Hungarian, also Yiddish sounds interesting, but even without that I doubt I can ever learn these seven languages even with my rather humble expectations. To think of it straight, I only really need English and German, the rest, of course, won't be in vain, but whether I can use these languages for something useful or entertaining is a good question.
I learn languages because they interest me, and that is, I say, quite a weak motivation if consider that my interests are hardly constant (and you could've seen that already). Apart from being surprised both by choice and situation, my biggest problem is motivation. Say, right now imagine how my fluent French would sound, but in a few weeks or months I just forget all that for something else.
Also, which is highly unlikely and yet possible, I can go total wanderlust and pick more languages.
Meh. Nerd? Not really. Mad? Oh yes!

I am most definitely rubbish when it comes to planning, am I not?..

[Via Diva]

Exactly a year ago I tweeted this:

It's not likely I am going to be that productive today. So far I have only been a total failure:
- tried reading aloud in German something I read two months ago - and all the tries are worse!
- essentially failed to comprehend the 4th lesson of the speakASAP course - be it my dumbness or the failures of the course
- didn't do anything about 3rd lesson except a few brief glances at the table
- didn't activate my Memrise vocabulary
- haven't got the slightest idea of what were people in Český rozhlas Plus talking about up until it was summarized before the end
The only thing I managed to do good today is L-R'ing Herr aller Dinge
Oh, and yesterday I finished Harry Potter a kámen mudrců. I have to admit, I was hugely fed up with the reader, and I honestly don't know what kept me walking, Probably the fact that Voldemort was voiced SO GOOD I understood almost everything he said. I will start Harry Potter a Tajemná komnata later this evening.
Well... we all have our ups and downs.

[Via Diva]

While my studies went almost completely passive, I don't really think that this is so bad. After all, Harry Potter a Tajemná komnata has a lot better reader, so much better that, in fact, I swallowed three chapters at once. Well, he's just a bit too slow, but isn't that what I need? And Herr aller Dinge is also becoming so interesting that I spent around 160 minutes staring at the German text and listening to the German audio. All hail L-R!
The speakASAP course is a major annoyance. I finally installed the Czech layout, and it's indeed fascinating, but the reason why I did that isn't:

I got nothing right from the first time, and only figured out the 11th all by myself. Because the wonderful authors don't tell where should I put být. I suspect that its position is flexible, but this is not clarified.
Oh, and yes, this is the lesson #6, not 5, because it's useless to do 5th if you don't know the past tense.
I really have to do more active studies.
But when do I ever do what I have to do?..

[Via Diva]

My day is planned. I didn't want to write about that this morning, because then I'd definitely not follow it (I guess a rebel inside me is bigger than one can think), but now the most part of this plan is done and there'd be no harm in telling:
1) Český rozhlas Plus + some casual game, count fully because these casual games just keep my hands busy
2) L-Ring Herr aller Dinge, with lots of pauses, count fully for obvious reasons
3) Memrise session, with pauses, usually take less than half an hour PURE study time (as the website counts), IRL it takes me longer, count fully for obvious reasons
4) dealing with the speakASAP course, count fully for obvious reasons
5) random stuff (like listening to more Český rozhlas Plus or to B5 aktuell, handwriting, trying textbooks), counting depends on attention paid, but if I'm cooking I count fully because I just do mechanical stuff which doesn't involve any thinking which could distract me
6) L-Ring Harry Potter, count fully for obvious reasons
5 and 6 can swap their places, or 5 can double
Plus some music inbetween.
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The random stuff from yesterday included handwriting of Sudvěj:

It took me 33 minutes and it looks worse than the previous try:

but, unlike the previous one, it's finished! (you can find all the photos in my Twi.
I have to note that this is actually useful, helps with the understanding a lot. If I heard only some common words before (batistu), I've managed to notice more stuff I should understand without translation. The major problem is, of course, false friends: Czech čas and rodina DON'T mean Russian chas and rodina...
Harry Potter still feels good, although not unbelievably good. Not sure what to feel about the radio, even German is alien sometimes.
Some funny etymology which I encountered in today's more than two hours of L-Ring Herr aller Dinge:

But, well, Czech can be linked with German too, especially when I type German "Etymologie" to discover that it looks exactly like the Czech "etymologie". The pronunciation has to differ though.
Today's Memrise featured a long review session in which I typed using the Czech keyboard layout. It took LOADS of time. But there's no other way to get used to typing than to type, and to type with ALL THE DIACRITICS.
I had to look up exactly the half of this from the lesson #5:

but, essentially, when you stop to try to understand WHY does by change its form, it's not that hard.
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Czech. Makes me too emotional around half a month now.

[Via Diva]

the Chechen capital Грозный

Fixed ;)
Always pay attention to these cognates. Sometimes not only are they false friends, but the complete opposites: čerstvý chleb means fresh bread in Czech, whereas чёрствый хлеб in Russian is stale bread. Or ужасный and užasný, hehe. What is absolutely funny for me - the word fajn.
And, well, the word order isn't fixed, you can use SVO if that's comfortable for you, hehe. Czech at least has mám and být, Russian doesn't provide such an easy start. But I guess almost every English native who decides to study Russian, doesn't really expect anything to be easy xD

[Via Diva]

Oookay. I figured out what's wrong with the speakASAP course. It requires immersion, listening:

Будущее время в чешском языке лучше всего запоминать на слух. Очень часто оно будет созвучно с русским.
Вобще, чешский язык – это тот язык, который нужно учить на повторении чешской речи, на слух.

Well this is no way for me*. I am psychologically deaf when it comes to this.
So that's why I didn't even try to do the exercises. There was no "learn through listening" in their very good German course, so that one was much easier for me (also I wasn't a beginner).
It's time to admit the defeat, stop dreaming about achieving some fluency (I can't say a single sentence in Czech! This might be psychological too, but it doesn't even matter) and get my ass in front of a textbook (not literally, or that won't work either).

Of course, I didn't follow my plan today. I can say to je sobota! (oh, a sentence in Czech! Maybe things aren't all bad after all?), but we all know that I am just rubbish at planning :)

The amount of t's I forget to cross in my #Czech handwriting is loo damn high! #PunIntended

Yesterday I fell the victim of Mikymauz and wrote its text. I swear I didn't intend to do that:


* No, this is not stopping me from doing L-R. All hail logic!