Edit - I have missed a recording.

To be honest, I saw this coming. I've been spread too thin lately that I haven't been able to study as much as I want to. Between writing, teaching myself how to draw, working, job hunting, social life, teaching myself to play the violin, and daily things, I have very little time. That is why this was doomed from the start.

I've been doing some reflection on my life, and while I still love to learn languages, it is not my highest priority. German and other languages can wait, I have my whole life ahead of me and I can learn in the years to come. That doesn't mean I'll put it off forever, just until I can cut other things out and simplify my life. Particularly the working and job hunting. Once I get a stable job there'll be much more time in my day.

But, I've made a promise and I'm going to stick to it. I've messaged LupoMikti for a "punishment." If he doesn't have anything for me, I'll leave a message implying it's open to other people.

Recording / Date
01 - June 21st (I'm gonna need to get a mic.)

02 - 4th of July
(I completely space out when I try to talk, as I can't think of anything to talk about. I try to say that I put this up a day early because I will be visiting my folks for the weekend. Then I mumble about word cards for 20 seconds before giving up.)

03 - 19th of July
I ramble along for a minute and a half about the new job I just got this weekend! (Posted at 11:27 PM! I almost missed it!)

04 - 2nd of August
Absolutely exhausted after moving today lugging around boxes and furniture, I plop myself down in front of the computer and recorded this minute and a half of rambling. I haven't been practicing as much as I wish I had, and I try to explain that even though I was busy with the move, it wasn't an excuse (but I forgot the word and mocked myself in Japanese for it. Whenever I try to speak German, the strangest urges to say Japanese words come up at times.)

05 - 16th of August
So, with my new job, trying to get back to writing and drawing, I haven't done as much studying as I wish I have done, but I still made some progress. I am very excited to finally try out my new microphone (my blasted laptop has the mic-headphone combo plugs so I had to order a special splitter just so I could use the mic that came in just the other day.) Fair warning if you listen, even with the pop-shield, you are going to hear a lot of nasty tongue clicking and other disgusting mouth noises (this is the very first time I used the mic). I speak for a minute and a half, trying to talk about my new job and how I lost five pounds in one week just by not drinking any soda.

06 - 30th of August
Quite an eventful past two weeks! I've been very busy between this new job and trying to get caught up on my projects. My 13-year old chihuahua got sick, I spoke with some real German peoples, and my birthday is coming up! (Also, I'm going to Atlanta for Dragoncon)

07 - 13th of September
I feel like I must apologize, for I have not been studying as much as I originally said I would. This past month with the new job has been pretty tiring. I haven't studied at all these past two weeks and feel like I've gotten worse. I need to develop better habits in my life. As a wise philosopher once said: "Success isn't an action, it's a habit." Or something like that.

08 - 27th of September
Between my new job (which I constantly work late for), trying to teach myself to draw, going to the gym, AND writing for this site, I have very little free time. I need to sort out my priorities. A little bit each day can make a huge difference, and that's what I originally set out to do, but when I try to write or draw first, I run out of energy and go to bed without studying. So I spent this weekend thinking things over about how I spend my time. I speak a bit about the above and use a new word I learned: "Zeichentrickzeichner." It means Cartoonist.
*EDIT - I just realized I exported this file as a .wav, so it won't play on google drive media player.

09 - 11th of October
I don't like my new job. I've been working late every day and I have a 45 minute commute back. I've been very tired lately and studying German has not been fun recently, which makes it harder to study. I've been in a bit of a slump and I don't feel like I've improved at all, if not actually get worse. I feel like I need to remind myself why I got excited about learning languages in the first place.

10 - 25th of October
I don't like my new job. Have I mentioned that before? I leave home around 7 and come back after 7, my boss is very condescending, and I hate the place I work at. Currently looking for a new job that will be less demanding and more welcoming. Still getting by with the BARE minimum of studying.

Next recording due on November 8th

---

I have a confession to make.

I haven't been studying German as much as I would like to. It's been on and off for a year, and at the slightest bump in the road of life I would lose grip on my studies. As a way of motivating me to strengthen my resolve and my grip on languages, I've decided to record my progress every two weeks. Every day I will study a little German in the morning and in the evening, and when two weeks have passed, I'll record myself blabbing in the language for one whole minute, trying to talk about as much as I can. No script, no retakes. Just me and what I have learned. This shall continue until the end of December because I confident I can get German down in six months.

So, for accountability, if I miss an update day and don't have a new file linked by that Sunday at midnight, the first person to comment gets to decide how I get punished. (Yes, I'm doing this). Read your work? I'll read it, comment it, and give it a shout out on a forum. Make art for you? I'll do my best. You want me to write clop? I'll write clop. So, be checking back on the dates for the next update!

There is no backing out on this.

Viel Gluck! Ich wünsche, dass ich deines Niveau der Entschlossenheit hatte. Ich muss mehr üben, aber ich muss langsam studieren. Ich weiß viele Worten nicht und die, dass ich kenne, sind schwer zu merken.

That took forever to write… hopefully there aren't too many mistakes… anyway, this is a great idea and I'll be sure to listen to each one

Idömö wid dör sylon…

Lupo

4488329
Thanks for your support.

I really can't tell if there are mistakes in your German yet, since the biggest thing I have problems with are the grammar. I'm just not used to how they construct fragments of sentences based on function. Half the time I don't know if I should move the verb to the back or use that confounded "um." That should go away with time.

And I do not plan on missing any of them (already marked my calendar). I do not plan on writing any clop.

4511559 Haha, you don't have to worry about me requesting clop. It's actually been a good year, year-and-a-half, since the last clop story I read, and even then only by authors that write good quality stuff regardless of content.

Yeah, grammar's really difficult for me too. I figured out that verbs get sent to the end in subordinate/dependent clauses, and when modals are used, the main verb goes to the end in the independent clause, unless V2 order kicks in. Then there's the horrifying case of modal+main verb in a dependent clause… I'm still not sure what to do in that case and same goes for when to use zu+verb or um or even zum sometimes. What I really need is something like a highschool course or two to get me familiarized with the basics and create a good foundation for learning. This is what happened with me for Spanish… I took 4 years of it in highschool and have a strong foundation on grammar, including the subjunctive. Self-study has been one of the most difficult things for me in language learning. Also discipline to constantly study and practice

What helped a bit on word order for me was to translate almost literally. So that first sentence I wrote, ich wünsche, dass ich deines Niveau der Entschlossenheit hatte, would be "I wish that I your level of determination had." Because English is a Germanic language, translating German literally can sometimes lead to old formal sounding English. Although literal won't always help, for the simple things it can really make a difference in understanding.

4485781I know that feel of trying to find things to say when nothing comes to mind, man

Keep up the good work. I enjoy these so much they're starting to make me want to do the same thing.

4485781 I'm just gonna keep exclaiming how much I love that you're doing this

I just got around to listening to the July 19th one (looking forward to tomorrow's) and was happy to hear the amount you've improved. But what also made me giddy with joy was being able to recognize your mistakes. I know that sounds like a weird thing to say, but the fact that I could point out mistakes in your word order means I'm slowly beginning to get a feel for what's correct even though it's so different from English. For example, every time you started a clause with Jetzt, you forgot to do V2 word order after it; instead of "Jetzt, ich habe…" it should've been "Jetzt habe ich…"

It's really nice to have these to look forward to every two weeks, so continue to make sure you don't miss a single one (mostly because I cannot for the life of me come up with a "punishment" if you do )

4595798
That is very nice of you to say. Thank you

You'll catch me in the newest recording that I accidentally added an unneccessary verb in a sentence and then repeat the sentence to repeat myself. Anyway, I know what you mean. After being constantly exposed to a language, you begin to develop a feel for a language; while you may not be able to say why something sounds wrong, you just know from you it sounds that there is something amiss.

Things in my personal life have been settling down now, but that is no excuse. If learning is important to me, I should always have time for it. As well as reading, drawing, and what-have-you.

Your continued support makes me want to study and maintain healthy study habits even more! (That sounded so corny but I mean it.)

4599025 Gern Geschehen! I just did my fair share of moving yesterday as well, and am already paying for it with the soreness

I tend to slip into Spanish as well when I can't remember a word. I'll stop and say "oh, ¿puedo recordar la palabra en español pero no en alemán?"

I hope you're able to really get into the studying. I can figure out from your Duo profile that you're on the Comparison and Qualifiers row of the tree (or at least almost there), so you're progressing pretty quickly. I'm on the Abstract Objects 2 skill myself. If I keep up the schedule I just laid out for myself, I'll be able to finish the tree in 7 days. Then I get to move on to outside study. I can't wait until we're able to write these comments fully in German

Viel Gluck! Haben Sie eine gute Nacht! … oder einen guten Tag, wenn Sie diesen Kommentar im Morgen oder Nachmittag erhalten…

4599025 Welp, you finally did it… you got me to record one of these things myself

Here's the link

Everything was going pretty well until I forgot a word at the end and then tried to guess it. Turns out, when I guess words in German, I get Spanish

It was really fun doing this. I don't know if I'll try to stick to a schedule like you, but I'll definitely do this again. I tried to do a basic introduction just stating some facts about myself. I know you're trying to do everything on-the-fly but I sort of had to have a 'template' so to speak. Just a basic outline of what I was going say, and I looked up a few words I didn't know as well, but you can tell when I start to try and improvise a little bit. I noticed that I need to work on pronouncing regular U's not like an Ü. Apparently I naturally front that sound when it should be further back in my throat.

Next week school starts too. Maybe I can talk about that next? Probably. Actually, let's rewrite those sentences in German: Nächste Woche beginnt der Schule als auch. Vielleicht kann ich darüber im nächsten Mal sprechen. Wahrscheinlich.

There we go, that's better

Edit: Ahh! I just realized I used a word for a verb that doesn't actually exist! Instead of üben for 'to practice' I said übungen I know it's not that big of a deal but it still gets to me

Looking forward to your next recording! Idömö wid dör sylon…

Lupo

4646864
Damn it! You sound better than me!

GRRRRAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!

Just kidding. I'm glad you're motivated to do more. Es hilfe mir auch! Ich möchte auf mehr studieren.

4649788 Haha, Vielen Dank! It helps to have spent hours and hours practicing German 'ch' by itself and in words Though I still struggle with it if it comes three times in a row (e.g. "Ich spreche nicht" or something like that).

I'd recommend learning IPA (the International Phonetic Alphabet) so you can look up the phonology of languages at some point (I wouldn't call it a priority for you now since the reason I learned it was because I was creating languages, not just learning them, but it's helped greatly).

German ch is often transliterated as either /x/ or /ç/. I pronounce it /x/ most of the time now, but used to pronounce it /ç/ because /x/ is more difficult. Here's a link to the tables with most letters having audio that you can listen to; just click on a letter and a short recording should play (needs Quicktime to work but your browser should have it installed already). Once I got that down and just spent hours practicing pronouncing words over and over again, both alone and in sentences, making the sounds became less of a challenge. Now I need to work on actually forming sentences of my own. The ultimate goal is to be able to think in your target language. When that happens I'll surely feel an immeasurable amount of joy from it.

I've gotta say it's really nice knowing there's someone else out there also struggling to learn the same language as you and be able to talk to them, even in brief like this. In just the past month I've taken more steps toward improving my German than I have in my entire year or so of learning it. So thank you, so very much

Mögest du großer Erfolg in deiner Studien haben…

Lupo

4485781 *psst* *whispers* You forgot to change the date and number of the recording in the comment

\Es tut mir leid\, dass dein Hund krank war. Das kann ein gutes \Gefühl nicht sein. Ich hoffe, alles ist \nun gut

Ich wollte eine \Aufzeichnung machen während dieser Woche, aber ich habe sehr \beschäftigt wegen des \Anfangs des \Schuljahres gewesen. Doch bin ich \glücklich, \einige Arbeit zu haben. Der Sommer war sowohl \aufregend als \ereignislos.

Nun, \bis zum nächsten Mal\. Oh, und Alles gute zum Geburtstag!

Lupo

I hope my writing this comment in German is okay with you ; I'd be happy to provide the translation if you want. I just really wanted to practice a bit. I had to look up 12 words and/or phrases to write it (which I decided to mark with backslashes), so hopefully I can get that number down in future comments

Edit: more detailed analysis of how much I had to look up vs. how much I knew in the style of the comment that follows this one.

12 things looked up: out of 67 words total, 10 were individual words, 2 were phrases each consisting of 4 words, making 18 words total for a "percent known" of approx. 73.1%.

Ich habe auch sehr beschäftigt gewesen. Ich sollte erklären: ich studiere Astrophysik und \Informatik, also meine Klassen \ziemlich schwer sind. Ich habe nur drei Klassen (Physik: \Elektrizität und \Magnetismus, \Datenstrukturen mit C++, \Diskrete Mathematik für Informatik) aber es \scheint, wie fünf. Es gibt einige andere Sachen, ich muss \mich auseinandersetzen\ aber das ist \weder hier noch dort\. \Setze bitte deine Studien \fort… es helft auch mir so viel

Viel Glück!

10 things I had to look up this time: out of 70 words total, 7 were individual words, 1 was a phrase consisting of 4 words, one was a reflexive verb thus 2 words, and one was a separable verb thus another 2 words, making 17 words total for a "percent known" of approx. 75.7%. Again, I'd be more than happy to provide the translation if you want…

Idömö wid dör sylon…

Lupo