Boo-yah!
      That’s right – I’m finally doing what I’ve wanted to do for ages and years and forever… I’m learning a foreign language.
      Using a combination of Duolingo.com, their smartphone app, and Spanish.About.Com (for more in depth explanations of grammar) I have been going for 14 days so far. Maybe that doesn’t sound like a lot, but usually I try for a day…five… a week tops, and then give up. I don’t feel like I’m really learning or retaining anything, I get discouraged and sort of just…forget.
      I think having it on my phone (so I can do a lesson or a review whenever I’m just killing time really helps. For instance, on my way home from the eye doctor today (Mark was driving), I pulled up the app and he laughed at my accent while I reviewed sentences like the above. Also, when I’m sprawled out in bed, I can take a few lessons or reviews without issue.
      I’ve got about 198 words in my “list” so far and I’m comfortable with 85% of them at least. A few of them I keep confusing with others. And a few, I thought I knew, but then I guess I just totally learned them wrong in the past. Worse, a couple of the most recent lessons were in conjunctions & prepositions.
      I am having trouble understanding the personal a, though in theory, I understand when to use it.
      I am having issues remembering that sobre is on top of, and then cerca/acerca… Oy vey!
      I’m too old for all this stuff.
      Yet, somehow I am really feeling like I get it.
      More or less, when the voice at Duolingo says “Quiero un emparedado sin queso, por favor” I know exactly that she’s saying “I want a sandwich without cheese, please”. Except for a few weird pronunciation things (her “nada”, to swim, sounds like papa or something, for one) I just- I am just-
      Hablo español.
      Sorta.
      Anyway – I hope to continue to update with my progress as I continue to plug through the Duolingo stuff and then shift to other books/courses and eventually, speaking Spanish with like, people who speak Spanish. HAH!

      (The sentence in the title is actually from a review I did tonight: The cat sleeps on top of the monkey. Brave fucking cat, lol. Monkeys can be mean little bastards!)

Note: Image is “Spain Map 2” by (dariuszman) from SXC.hu