For several hours last night and this morning, I have been working with the Spanish Grammar reference guide that Jon Graham Mitchell bequeathed to me on Saturday, and it is solidifying so much of what I learned earlier through books in an immensely helpful way.
The four-page laminated reference guide is in super small print (for someone with 74 year old eyes!), so I’m handwriting what’s on it into a notebook. I’ve just finished page two of the four pages. I did the first one last night before bed and the second one this morning while waiting for groceries to be delivered.
Handwriting the information helps me process what’s on the pages far better than just reading the guide alone would do, even if I read it every day for a solid week.
Handwriting the information sentence by sentence slows me down enough to help my brain process what each sentence is communicating, which cues me to think, “Oh, yeah! I remember this from my earlier lessons!” but it’s pretty much all right there (the most crucial things to remember) — and with immediate examples — but in shorter form. I don’t think it would substitute entirely for what I’ve learned before, but it certainly reinforces that I have become a great deal more fluent as far as Spanish sentence structure and tenses go.
I’m enjoying the heck out of the process!
Update at 3:15 p.m. I got all of the information moved to lined notebook pages. 28 total pages (14 two-sided pages). WOW! They crammed a lot into four pages — no wonder the font was so freakin’ small! LOL!
In Other News:
I haven’t walked yet today and probably won’t now, this late in the morning (almost 11). The sun would be out all along the route and the UV rate is super unhealthy for prolonged exposure, so I’ll just skip it this time.
Instead, I’ve popped the carcass of a whole chicken into the crockpot so it will be ready by dinnertime, and I’ve started cooking more brown rice because I ate the last of it yesterday afternoon.
BANK UPDATE
I found out that I can withdraw the entire amount for the February rent and security deposit in a single transaction using my debit card, so I’m going to be doing that closer to the time when I need to go pay it. This certainly simplifies and saves me transaction fees, since I can do it in one fell swoop. I will remember that for next time.
For months, I have been taking out $200 a week (in colones for this casita) thinking that my daily withdrawal limit was $250 and I only go into town about once a week. I finally went to the credit union site and looked, since Davidienda Bank charges non-customers $10 per transaction and Banco Nacional — where I usually withdraw my colones from (and will continue to do so because of D’s high withdrawal fee!) — doesn’t dispense USDs. My credit union refunds the transaction fees at Banco National. I will look to see it they do the same at Davidienda.
FACEBOOK WON’T LET ME POST AGAIN UNTIL LATER TONIGHT — GRRRR!!! — SO I’LL PUBLISH THIS TOMORROW.