New Language-Learning Supplies Arrive!

All this week I worked on a large proposal relating to Syntaxis, my business with Brandt.

Proposal writing and language learning, I have decided, are not compatible activities. At least not for me. Every minute I was not working on the proposal, I felt I should be working on the proposal.

Santa Clauses Proliferated This Week

Although I tried very hard not to feel that way, I failed.

Through it all I kept studying, but less than before, and less enjoyably. I also stopped running for the week, capping off that consistent neglect last night with—in honor of finishing the proposal—two enormous pieces of pizza and six brownies. That three-to-one ratio struck me as just about right at the time, but the pizza was disappointing, both in the moment and in the aftermath, and the brownies, while lovely in the moment, were perhaps excessive and did not continue to produce joy once the last one had been washed down with milk.

But the proposal is now done, and I can relax and devote my full attention this weekend to Japanese verbs and particles and other fun stuff like that.

So I ran today. And liked it.

I also liked my new Japanese books, which arrived this afternoon and which I ordered because I desperately need help with the Japanese writing system. The books are childlike—one even has cartoons—and I think that’s about the level I need right now.

I studied. And I liked that, too. It was pretty heavenly, in fact—much better than brownies.