Progress Update: 7/6

Now that summer classes have finished, I have much more time to dedicate to more serious study. I've started reading デスノート, and I finished the first chapter this afternoon. I managed to mine 22 sentences from there, although I might go back and add more later. I'm really surprised that I can read and understand most of what's going on without having to whip out my 辞書 iTouch app. (Japanese, in case you're curious. Highly recommended.)
I'm still working re-doing all my kanji, but I'm already more than halfway finished. It really isn't so bad the second time around.
Also, I made a "victory calendar" spreadsheet to track my progress. It's basically a chart where I can mark if I did my listening, reading, and SRS practice for the day. But I'm also counting down to how many more days until I should be reasonably "fluent" (18 months, according to Khatzumoto). Since I began studying on or around 11/9/09, I am 240 days in to my study, leaving 300 to go until I'm "finished." That's scheduled to be on May 2nd, 2011. It's a little strange to have a definite date by which I'll at least be pretty good with the language. It really doesn't seem so far away, and it's a little hard to believe that I'll improve by so much by that time. I guess I can just hope for the best, and continue to soldier on!
