Entries this day: Dream Dream2

Dream

4:34 am Friday 4 May 2001

I've been awake for about 30 minutes;; I tried to go back to sleep but it didn't work.

(Early Dream)

With YRUU, camping out in the woods somewhere, I was in a building and was planning to go outside to jump on the trampoline, although the trampoline had some low hanging tree branches over it. And I had something stuck in the back of my mouth in my teeth.

Two non YRUU women were outside on a different trampoline, but they were just sitting on it and talking.

recent dream:

I was oferred a job with PBS television, doing some computer stuff. Looking through the job descriptions,.. there were actually two different jobs available, and they wanted me to fill one particular job more than the other particular job, but I could still take either one. I was reading through the descriptions when I woke up and had to P.

- - - - -

Last night after work I visited with Travis and Carolyn at the bookstore, looking at books on how to learn Japanese. According to Travis, there are basically two ways to learn:

1. start with learning the basic Kana (characters that represent a sound but have no meaning) in two different alphabets: Hirikana and Katikana. One of these alphabets is used to spell out the sounds of Japanese words, the other to spell foreign words. Then learn the Kanji, a character set whose characters have both a sound and a meaning. One must know about 6000 kanji to be able to read a Japanese newspaper.
2. Learn the sounds of Japanese words spelled out in Romanji, which uses our alphabet to spell out the sounds of the Kana and Kanji, and makes it easier to learn spoken Japanese quickly, but pretty much screws up written Japanese skillz, and actually doesn't do spoken Japanese perfectly because some of the Kana require sounds that our alphabet just doesn't have.

I'm going to learn the Kana and not get screwed up with Romanji.

He suggested a book series Japanese for Busy People (published by Kadasha press I think). They have a Kana version and a 'revised version' that has identical content but with Romanji added.

I will have to get some sort of audio to go with my books so I can make sure I'm pronouncing correctly. I will start with CDs and then maybe seek out some peeps who also want to learn. Or maybe someone who knows Japanese and wants to learn English.

Dream2

8:40 am Friday 4 May 2001

dream

Downtown skating, and tomorrow was the last day athat Diane would be in town so she and I could go skating together. I wanted to call her to confirm a skate date with her.

I crossed the street because I saw a very short rollercoaster - a short version of Greezed Lightning (a shuttle loop coaster for those who know what that means) that was built between a building and the street surrounded by a wobbly chain link fence.

I leaned on the fence and asked the guy how much it cost to ride and he said it was free once I get inside the fence, and that normally costs ten dollars. But if I just climbed over the fence that would be okay too.

The train was running as we talked, and though I couldn't hear it, I thought I would have to shout for the guy to hear me.