Having a convenient way to see my goals or todo items is way more conducive to me to make them happen. Versus if I can’t see them, I’m more likely to forget and never take action, as they say, “Out of sight, out of mind.”

Now I look for and embrace that kind of uncomfortableness. To me, it means that I’m growing, learning something new, trying something different or improving on something. I think to myself that the opposite is being comfortable which means I’m not growing, learning or improving. So that’s what the reminder to myself to get uncomfortable is about.

Tools

First, I used the Kana-a-Day Practice Pad and a series of flash cards with the stroke on the front and how to pronounce the character on the back (I couldn’t find a link to the specific ones I used). I checked out some websites too, but ultimately those were the two tools that I stuck with for the last 30 days.

Starting Out and How I did it in 30 Days

I remember the first Hiragana character I did in the practice pad, あ. I practiced that first one about seventy times. At first, it felt so awkward and difficult to write, but I did it. And at the end of the day, it felt very satisfying to have just learned one character since I had always been very intimidated about learning kana (and kanji), it always looked so hard to learn to me. But hey, I just learned one! That was a good feeling. I only did one character the first day and it felt great! The next day I did two characters. Then the following day, I also did two characters. After that I realized if I kept at this pace, learning one or two a day, it would take me half a year just to learn all of them! So, I started doing five per day to learn the initial 46 characters, then I would do six, nine, ten or twelve per day for the modified/combined characters depending upon how much time I had and how ambitious I was feeling. It took me 16 days to learn all 104 Hiragana, then I basically repeated the same thing for the Katakana, learning five per day for initial 46 characters, then doing a half a dozen or more after that. Once I got momentum going those first several days, it made it easier to stick with it. I think taking it slow those first couple of days helped me build confidence too.

Repetition, Forgetting and Remembering

When I was learning the kana, I would practice them in the Kana-a-Day pad. But then throughout the day I would write the characters I learned in multiple places: I would write them on the white board in my office, I would write them on the marker board on the refrigerator, I would use a dry erase marker to write them on the mirror in the bathroom and I would practice them on sticky notes. Throughout the day, I would forget the characters I had learned, but forgetting them and then remembering them again, seemed to make me remember them better. I would use the flash cards at random times throughout the day too. I think spreading out the learning worked better for me vs. trying to do them all at once and cramming them in my brain. I would spend several minutes in the morning learning a new batch of characters and then throughout the day it would only take a minute or two to practice/review them all. I would always try to review the ones I already learned and the ones I just learned too. And then if I forgot one, I would just look how to do it and then that would make it easier to remember for the next time. So, I think the first key that worked for me was forgetting them and then remembering them throughout the day. And learning/practicing them in multiple sessions throughout the day vs. just doing one session.

Mnemonic Devices

The other method I used was trying to find mnemonic devices for the characters. I found it easy for some of the characters, but for others it didn’t really work. Like an obvious one is the Katakana character for shi: シ, so I think, she’s smiling (or smirking). Or for the Hiragana characters, ku: く, I remember “less than” which helps me remember the next character, ke: け, which I think of writing “lt” (for less than). Anyway, this helped me learn some of them, but for others I just had to learn them without a mnemonic device.

Summary

I know these tools and techniques won’t work for everyone, as everyone learns differently. But hopefully there’s something in here of value to someone out there. In summary I just took it slow for this first few days which built up my confidence. Writing the kana in different environments seemed to help. Practicing and reviewing them at random intervals throughout the day seemed to help too. And creating mnemonic devises and stories for each character made it funner and easier to remember.

Install Node.js
This will install Node.js v0.4.12, currently the latest stable version. Remember even-numbered versions of Node.js are stable, while odd-numbered versions are considered unstable.

$ sudo apt-get update
$ sudo apt-get install git-core curl build-essential openssl libssl-dev
$ git clone https://github.com/joyent/node.git && cd node
$ git checkout v0.4.12
$ ./configure
$ make -j2
$ sudo make install
$ node --version

Install NPM

$ curl http://npmjs.org/install.sh | sudo sh
$ npm --version

Install CoffeeScript

$ sudo  npm install -g coffee-script
$ coffee --version

Set up NODE_PATH
This step will let you use/include all your Node libraries (including CoffeeScript) in Node.

Add this to your ~/.bashrc file:

export NODE_PATH=/usr/local/lib/node_modules

Videos Tutorials and Diagrams

Galleries

Books

Other Websites

• For a temporary fix. Press F12 to bring up Quick Preferences and uncheck Enable Plugins.

But you’ll have to remember to enable/re-enable this every time. Or you can setup a a Site Preference to permanently disable Flash for the entire site.

• Go to the Preferences settings by pressing Ctrl + F12. Go to the Advanced tab. Click on Content, then click on the Manage Site Preferences button.
• Now add a new entry, for the site enter: www.citicards.com and then under the Content tab uncheck Enable Plugins.

After you do this, you should be able to use the site with no problems.

• Cambria
• Calibri
• Candara
• Consolas
• Constantia
• Corbel

The fonts come with Microsoft’s PowerPoint Viewer. Download that application, then use a program like 7-Zip to extract the files. You’ll then have the fonts for free without having to install any software.

• Download Microsoft Office PowerPoint Viewer 2007
• Then right-click the file and select “7-Zip” -> “Extract Here.”

After the files have been extracted, you can sort the files by file type, then all of the fonts will be grouped for you to install. And there you go, you can have all the fonts without installing any software.

I have the Panasonic BL-C131A webcam. I set it up on top of some games and books and pointed it at the TV. The webcam has a site you can access over the Internet. So, when I log into the webcam’s site, I can check out whatever is on the TV. I have to leave the TV on since I can’t turn it on and off remotely. The quality isn’t exactly HD and you can’t change the channels, hence the poor man’s version. But I already had the webcam, so now it can serve two purposes.

Click here to check out the webcam.

Login: colorado
Password: rockies

I’m going to take it down after the Rockies season is done.

I washed the three pairs of pants with 1 box (1 lb.) of baking soda, 1 cup of detergent, hot water, medium load and the heavy/heavy setting. And then I dried them in the sun on the fence. And that got rid of the stink!

I got a lot of compliments on the pumpkins from the trick-or-treaters; I just told them, “All I did was follow the patterns!” I think they came out pretty good too. The pattern for Punkula was actually spelled Puncula, but I like Punkula better, so that’s what I’m going with!