I was thinking about the standards i hold myself up for with japanese with the goal of understand 95%~ of the text that i’m reading on websites. of course if it’s of no interest to me i’m not going to waste my time googling that to find out what it means or what it is (sometimes it’s just something i just wouldn’t know because i’m not japanese and i haven’t lived in japan or whatever). Then I was thinking hey i haven’t reached this goal with english with the 95%~ comprehension for websites (well you could argue, not knowing or being unsure of the meaning of a couple adjectives/verbs/nouns doesn’t necessarily kill the comprehension… depends how important it is to the whole picture). It really is dependent on what i’m reading in english even if it’s a blog if it’s well-written they’ll be complex grammar where i’ll have to read the sentence again or they’ll be words I don’t know. Some people are just good writers and they just use words i don’t know. Whether it’s blog entries or news articles, if it’s fairly well-written then i will come across words i do not know. I’m not gonna start reading the new york times or whatever other boring ass newspaper to improve my vocabulary. that’s torture. I don’t do that for japanese and i’m not gonna do that for english. But I found a good way to learn vocabulary.
BTW you should know that firefox has awesome plug-ins/add-ons for looking up words and for saving text to file while you’re reading the internet. i downloaded dictionary.com and if you double click it tells you the meaning (I like merriam webster better but fast and efficient is KICKASS). the sucky part is if you click on the audio thing for the audio bit it’ll take a while so i will actually hear the prnounciation faster by going to m-w and looking up the word than waiting for the add-on to fetch the audio. I think with english especially hearing the word is useful and sometimes it’s spelled really weird or it’s ambiguous with the pronounciation. even if they have that gibberish to tell you how to pronounce it, it’s just a lot more clear with the audio. i’m checking out other add-ons so it’s more easy to collect/mine the stuff like with rikai-sama if you press S it saves the SENTENCE, DEFINITION, into a notepad file!!! like how awesome is that. so i’m seeing if any of the plug-ins are as kickass as that on firefox.
SO ANYWAYS the most important part is the SOURCE of the sentence/sparagraphs that you leran the vocabulary from. it has to be not too difficult/ridiculous/useless/archaic/etc and at the same time it has to hold your interest… otherwise why the hell would the context help you remember if you don’t give a shit about the actual thing you’re reading ie crappy newspapers. It’s like AJATT it has to be something you enjoy.
So this is what I found really useful/helpful and i think it could be applicable to other people … well bear with me. i hope somebody gets something out of what i wrote.
I find mad men really useful for learning vocabulary. i look up words they use in the show and what i always always do starting since some season of mad men is I read other people’s thoughts and analysis of the episode. ONE is because the show mad men is just very sophisticated like the dialogue is just not straight forward sometimes i miss out or i misinterpret????? TWO it’s just a well-done and there’s a lot of shit going on (If you don’t think so, you need to venture out into the INTERNET. THREE even if i were to re-watch it, i wouldn’t get as much out of it compared to just reading somebody else’s thoughts about it. other people just better at getting stuff out of that show. FOUR lots of mad men fans do it. FIVE it makes me want to watch more actively for the next episode like i want to notice stuff as much as the other peeps. SIX mad men fans are smart/educated (some of them are probably old right? like they were actually alive in the 60s lol) . some stuff i’ve seen written by mad men fans are just so well-written with the sentence/paragraph I have to re-read or the big words I don’t know. SEVEN it’s season 6, i forget stuff lol…. like i said this show’s well-done with the continuity and all that. i’ll literally watch an episode there’s some character and i have no idea who it is ( I couldn’t figure it out just from watching the ep because i like said mad men is never relaly that explicit and clear) or i forgot who it was (they showed up in some other season) and then i have to refresh myself lol. I watch it once a year when it airs so….
Even though they’re using big words I care and I know what they’re talking about (the thing they’re describing) because I watched the episode. It’s sort of a game too like they’ll describe the character as some word I don’t know and I’ve seen the episode so I’ll be like oh i think that’s a fancy word for __ and then i can see if i’m right. but usually now a days i have no imagination so i don’t even guess lol. The reason it works so well for me is because it’s so well-written and i really care about what the person writes about. it’s just the perfect environment for learning the vocab.
Now I don’t know what to do with the vocabulary. I saved the sentences with the definition on a notepad which i later transfer to EVERNOTE (kickass progrma, highly reocmmended thank you tofugu though their entries of late are complete shit , very lazy for the most part) . I looked at the sentences i collected they really are a pleasure to read lol… like no wonder i looked it up. I’ve always looked up words when i read particularly well-written stimulating blog entries or news articles or whateve rbut i never collected them. but i feel like collecting is helpful because the context is just so compatible with me. like i realy really give a shit! I don’t know about adding the sentences to anki or anything like that. I do that with japanese and i don’t want to do that with english. english is my native language even if my vocab is low compared to people who read many more books that i have. I do want to improve my vocabulary like anyone else (who has a brain). if you don’t know the awesomeness/benefits of reading and vocabulary on YOUR LIFE, then you need to read up on that. I was literally tortured by people who do not read much/possess much vocabulary which was evident in their vapidly empty annoying blithering conversations. check out my lang-8 for that, you gotta be my friend to read it though!
so I found an awesome source to TAP to get the words that i do not know that i want to know. who wants to learn from a list from sat or act or gre or whatever…. half the crap just seems useless becaues you never heard of it. it relaly is like AJATT you gotta find something that’s enjoyable. I do have a desire to improve my vocabulary and i’ve found the right medium. I’m not sure if this works with other shows… mad men is just so SPECIAL AND well-done and there really is a lot to talk about plus some shows why would you care enough to read about other people’s thoguhts lol ie gossip girl/anything on cw for that matter. of course that show would attract fans who are good at writing and intelligent lol. I’m also reading books too btw it’s just hard because I want to read japanese books too lol.
Basically I encourage looking up words while reading the internet since there are some awesome tools. there’s no reason not to. it’s 2013 bitch! I checked out chrome, chrome has awesome addons/extensions too… the dictionary for that fetches the audio instantaneously!! so perhaps that’s a perk that can’t go ignored. hearing the word is really helpful to remembering it so that the next time you come across it, they’ll be a higher chance of having some feeling of familiarity.
here’s a copy paste of the stuff just so yo know what i mean… more clearly. if you haven’t seen mad men season 6 up to episode 4 there might be SPOILERS… i hope most people will see what i pasted and go i don’t know those words eitther lol. that’s what i’m thinking but i’ve been neglecting english for the past 4 years? loll with the japanese. I don’t want my english to turn to crap or stop growing but at the same time iwant to also learn french a lot… not to fluency of course (that’s very very high goal) because first of all i haven’t even discovered what thing about france interests me.. the reason i mention french because it’s romance language and they’re based on latin so french itself would be helpful with expanding my english vocabulary but i’m curious as to how helpful learning french is vs. reading more in english with improving english vocabulary. because for korean if you don’t know hanja you can forget about expanding your vocabulary because it’s mostly (well ALOT OF) 2 syllable words that all sound the same lol… the difference are so who gives a shit arbitrary unless you know what to look out for with hanja. i’m curious if it’s as helpful as hanja was for korean/japanese. but then again if i think of it as how helpful is korean for advanced japanese vocabulary (advanced? wtf is that lol. I guess any and all words a fluent japanese speaker would know – that would encompass words that are based on kango, not based on kango) i don’t think it’s really helpful because they’re 2 different languages and they’re both based on kanji/hanja/chinese characters so not really…. not really for korean/japanese. yo know i read somewhere!!! it was on a language forum and they were talking about languages they’d forgotttten. someone said i forgot my damn german because all the common/daily convresation words are really similar to english and all the more advanced/difficult/beyond daily conversation words are not similar to english THEN for french all the daily/conversation stuff was not similar to english but all the advanced words are similar to english… so they were saying german was more easily forgotten? unless they said it the other way around. so maybe learning french will be helpful provided it is the way i wrote it.
EXAMPLES
A self-proclaimed “rooster,” he shows Dick how a cock behaves, taking what he wants from women — both money and pleasure — without compunction.
+ a feeling of deep regret (usually for some misdeed)
After blithely saying that they’re both good company that he enjoys,
+ in a joyous manner
t was evident that Pete’s a whiner not a fighter, using aggrieved complaining to get what he thinks he deserves — and to deflect blame for his bad behavior.
+ aggrieve
v.
1. infringe on the rights of
+++ 2. cause to feel sorrow
patrician [pə’trɪʃn]
n.
1. a person of refined upbringing and manners
2. a member of the aristocracy
let Ted Chaough know that Heinz ketchup (“the Coca-Cola of condiments”) was pursuing potential suitors, and what was thought of as a clandestine tryst
++ adj. conducted with or marked by hidden aims or methods
it was something of a softball episode for the nascent director to undertake
+ the event of being born
and his sycophantic task of picking Pete up some toilet paper.
++
attempting to win favor from influential people by flattery
2. attempting
The fight between Peggy’s conscience and ambition wasn’t her only duel this week, there was also a pocket of resistance to quell from her male copywriting staff.
++
quell [kwel]
v.
1. suppress or crush completely
2. overcome or allay
One line in particular of Trudy’s was a pithy summation of her lot, and strongly reminiscent of season three Betty,
++
adj. concise and full of meaning
), Megan awkwardly tries to simply placate Don, walking on eggshells and cooking him a fancy chicken dinner (which came first, we wonder).
++ cause to be more favorably inclined; gain the good will of
But the real meat of the premiere (for me) is Don and Arnold Rosen. Don’s eagerness for Rosen’s approval has the tenor of a teenage crush.
++ Tenor: atmosphere, appearance, similarity to.
But Don, like Pete, is still stuck in the old model of infidelity, in which deception was de rigueur, even – or especially — when your spouse was knowing and – or especially — when your spouse was knowing and agreeable (as Trudy was with Pete)
++ : prescribed or required by fashion, etiquette, or custom : proper
litigant
(law) a party to a lawsuit; someone involved in litigation
litigation [‚lɪtɪ’geɪʃn]
n. a legal proceeding in a court; a judicial contest to determine and enforce legal rights
palimony
palimony
n. support paid by one half of an unmarried partnership after the relationship ends
A court-martial (plural courts-martial, as “martial” is postpositive) is a military court. A court-martial is empowered to determine the guilt of members of the armed forces subject to military law, and, if the defendant is found guilty, to decide upon punishment.
paleolithic [‚peɪlɪəʊ’lɪθɪk /‚pæl-]
n. second part of the Stone Age beginning about 750,00 to 500,000 years BC and lasting until the end of the last ice age about 8,500 years BC
adj. of or relating to the second period of the Stone Age (following the eolithic)
assignation [よs?g’ne??n]
n.
1. a secret rendezvous (especially between lovers)
2. the act of distributing by allotting or apportioning; distribution according to a plan
The season kick off is heavily preoccupied with death. It’s roughly two hours of Don and Roger looking, for different reasons, into the yawning maw of death and wondering what the whole point of their lives is.
maw = mouth
informal terms for the mouth
Here in paradise they look like the future, and this woman with her decrepit hairdo worships
foundling [‘faʊndlɪŋ]
n. a child who has been abandoned and whose parents are unknown
What has many times in the past been cited as a program about change came out screaming that it is more likely about similarity, repetition and the ephemeral nature of human life.
ephemeral [-rəl]
n. anything short-lived, as an insect that lives only for a day in its winged form
adj. lasting a very short time
has ideologues arguing over gay marriage and austerity while people are starving and dying, and a public that has lost all hope for a better future.
_++ n. the trait of great self-denial (especially refraining from worldly pleasures)
Only when we are back in the bitter cold of New York do we see that despite their beauty, their ruddy success, Don and Megan lack contemporary hair
++ adj.
1. inclined to a healthy reddish color often associated with outdoor life
2. of a color at the end of the color spectrum (next to orange); resembling the color of blood or cherries or tomatoes or rubies
She admires Joan as an intrepid groundbreaker who has conquered the big city and a male-dominated profession.
++= adj. invulnerable to fear or intimidation
In that, they’re contrasted with the passivity and acquiescence of women like Sylvia,
++ v. to agree or express agreement
acui-es (letter s)
t’s not entirely accurate to say that Joan is the distaff Don Draper—i
++ adj. characteristic of or peculiar to a woman
++ the sphere of work by women
Mad Men nights of drunken revelry, involving making out with strange young men and visiting hippie haunts—disappearing into other guises in other words, flexing whatever privilege they have, be it glamor, money,
++ bar
I remember browswing the AJATT blog a couple years ago. One thing that stood out to me was that I came across entries he wrote in Japanese as well as entries he wrote in english and then he wrote the japanese trnaslation/equivalent next to random english words/phrases/concepts or the other way around (I thought it was really cool that he knew all these words in japanese that he knows what to translate/say his free-flowing english it to in japanese… it was really specific english vocab— just random nouns– that i don’t use at all so just that right there was enough but he also knew how to say it or directly translate it to japanese. i found it impressive. don’t know abt you.)
초롱이 ★ ごきげんよう 