Kumi's Learning Log

I'm very looking forward to get the game, "Guitar Hero III" for PS2, but I got a bad news last week. It said that the release of "Guitar Hero III" for PS2 was postponed until someday next year. Oh NO!!

Someday!? When!?

Yesterday, I played "Guitar Hero III" again for three hours at my boy friend's house. He was speechless :-P So I want my own game but xbox360 plus the game is very expensive. I can't order it even for my Christmas present.

So I browsed the Internet to gather information about "Guitar Hero" then I found a free computer game named  "Frets on Fire". It looks like "Guitar Hero" but I can use a computer keyboard instead of a guitar controller. It sounds nice. I can enjoy this game until I get "Guitar Hero III".

To tell the truth, I believed in Santa Claus until I turned 12. Around the Christmas season, a lot of advertisement leaflets of department stores are circulated with a newspaper every year. I picked up one of them and chose a toy that I wanted. Then I cut out the picture of the toy and put it on the head of my bed on Christmas night.

I tried to stay awake until Santa Claus came to my home but I never succeeded. When I woke up the day after Christmas, I found the exact toy that I had wanted and the window of my room was slightly opened. I said "WOW! Mam! Santa Claus came to my room last night! He really exists."

But one day when I was a twelve-year-old, I learned the truth when I played hide-and-seek with my friends in my house. I entered my parents' room and opened the closet door to hide. The first thing I saw in the closet was a game that I had asked Santa Clause for as my next Christmas present. Then I realized everything.

My mother, who knew what I found, was very angry because she had tried to keep the secret for my sister and me for a long time. She wanted us to keep our dream. I was so scared at that time but I realized how much my mother loved us.

If I have a child, I will tell my child "Santa Claus exists."

Yesterday, my younger sister, who lives near my house with her husband and two children, suddenly called me at midnight. I was very surprised because she has never called me late at night. So I said aloud "What's wrong!?"

She was just laughing and said "Don't worry. It's nothing serious". She wanted to ask me how to make a document with illustrations. She had to make a document to use at kindergarten the next morning, but she didn't know how to put illustrations into a document.

I am an expert of the Word software because I have written some books for beginners. So I remember the commands. I told my sister the most simple way to download some illustrations from the Office on-line service and instructed her to put them into the document.

After that she sent me a "Thank You" email. She said her edited document looked better.
Keep it up!

Yesterday my boyfriend and I played Guitar Hero III on xbox360 together. It was so exciting. He bought an Asian version of Guitar Hero III at the game shop that sold a lot of overseas games. The wireless guitar shaped controller is pretty good. I want to buy it but I do not have a xbox360. Then I ordered the PS2 version at Amazon.co.jp. The release date is December 20. I cannot wait until then.

After playing Guitar Hero III, he showed me the live screen, and I found a game named Word Puzzle. It looked interesting so I asked him to download it. We played Word Puzzle just ten minutes or so, but I was so excited. I wanted to play it at home. When I came back home, I looked up that kind of word game on the Internet.

Finally, I found Word Search Deluxe game on line and I tried it. It looks so fun! I will buy it.

"BONES" Second season #6 was just aired on Friday at FOX channel in Japan. I like a conversation between Temperance and Booth. I also like Anjela's speaking. Their conversation is a little bit difficult for me but their voices are very attractive. I want to be a speaker like Anjela. She is very nice.

Anyway I have cleaned up my room all day, so I have to train English at night.

I have W-ZERO3[es] and I always look around for the way to use it more conveniently.

I have wanted to connect my W-ZERO3[es] to a LAN and to use Skype at a hotel when I go on a business trip. It had been impossible because W-ZERO3[es] did not have a function to connect to a LAN. But the other day, I found this article that reported how to connect to a LAN with W-ZEOR3[es]. WOW!

I instantly ordered some required parts on Amazon. Then I received them yesterday so I set them up.

I got it!

My W-ZERO3[es] connect to my LAN! After that, I installed Skype for Windows Mobile and tried to talk with it.

Unfortunately, the sound of my voice was awful. I called the free test contact and recorded my voice, but it was very noisy and the noise interrupted my communication.

I have to find some solutions...

Yesterday I went to Nagoya city on a day business trip. The purpose of this trip was to discuss about a writing seminar. I will teach the technique of Japanese technical writing at one of my client companies. This is the first time to teach technical writing so I need a lot of preparation.

Anyway I have to train to improve my English skill as usual. Now I am very interested in a pronunciation training. I'm looking for some schools to learn how to pronounce English perfectly.

This is the new start on VOX blog. I changed a blog title, URL, design and its concept. I'm sorry for your inconvenience but I think no one bookmark my former blog :-P

I will write about what or how I read, listen, talk, write and watch in English.

Now, I use some great services to learn English. They are:
    LingQ (former The Linguist)
    ICC
    iKnow!
All of them are very helpful to learn English.

Today, I imported a content of TIME Online into my LingQ and read it carefully. The article is "In Japan, Teaching English for Food". It is 800 words in length and I have to read it within four minutes. I didn't know I could do it. I will have a timer when I read a news.

I will watch an episode of Smallville and also work with English Trainer text before bed.

I'm watching so many TV shows, so sometimes, I'm confused which episode I have already watched in the series.
Then, I made a list. The table shows at a glance which story I have watched :-P