漢字を仕上げろ -- 第1節

At this point, I'm left with some 40 kanji that don't easily fit with groupings I've made so far.

I could use Kanshudo -- they have mnemonics, sort of arbitrary rather than the kind that use authentic parts authentically and make as much sense as possible -- but I can't find a way to make a page of the ones I want:  I can make flashcards, but only if I pay them.  So if it's going to be arbitrary mnemonics, I'll just do my own.  (So far these have been the hardest to remember, since they don't make groupings and the parts don't easily relate to the meaning -- not to me, anyway.)

Here goes:
備, as in 準備 (being ready).  Man at cliff 厂 ready to use 用 the grass 艹 to pull himself up.
音 is noise.
竟 is end (表外漢字):  the time when horrible noisy monsters walk the earth.  So
境 , boundary, is the ends of the earth, and
鏡 is a mirror, a metal-lined thing that you only see the front edge of and that ends my hope of being handsome.
接, touch/contact:          The lady's 女 come in; stand up 立 so you can take her hand 手.
 率, proportion/factor:   Looks like a half-thread is being squeezed till the water comes out between a lid and a platform, with a peg maybe to keep the thread tied.  Do this to find out the proportion of water that was a factor in the thread.
憲, law/constitution:     In a room 宀 there's a table ⺲ split 3 ways (for 2 sides plus a moderator), with a tally stick in the middle, because in their hearts 心 the sides want to fight.  And that's how laws are made.
承, be informed:           Kids need to learn.  With lines so they can take notes, and a splash of water because otherwise they're saying, "I need to stop doing my homework.  I'm thirsty."
衆, population/masses: Assembled people 乑 (dude in the middle, someone leaning on his right arm, couple of kids hanging on the left) of a common blood 血 form a national population.  (Works better for a homogeneous nation like ancient China than a nation of immigrants like mine.  But these are pretty old characters.)
忍, endure:                   A knife in the heart is a lot to endure!
認, believe/acknowledge/witness:   A belief is words that endure.
This is grueling.  More later.

備音 竟境 鏡接 率憲承衆忍認

Japanese Graded Readers 0:3:13-18

どろぼう                thief
捕まえる                catch
招待状                    invitation
返事                        reply
神様                        God? gods? either, I think, per jisho
披露宴                    reception
受付                        receptionist/information desk
祝儀袋                    gift envelopes
花束                        bouquet
引き出物                 gift
お喜せに                 With pleasure
首都                        capital city
混んで                    crowded
両                           counter for carriages
優先（席）             priority (seating)
お疲れ様でした      Thank you for your hard work
終点                        last stop/terminus
布                            cloth
飼う                        keep (animals)
七夕                       Tanabata
お願い                    wish
笹の葉                    bamboo leaves
付ける                    attach

Japanese Graded Readers 0:1:1-6

大豆                  soybeans

枝豆                  edamame (young soybeans steamed in pods)

もやし              bean sprouts

-きん                 fungus/bacterium

こうじきん       koji spores, used for fermenting

納豆                  fermented soybeans

油                      oil

汁                      soup

嫌い                  hate something

乾杯                  Cheers!

節分                  Setsubun, the holiday of winter's end

鬼                      demon

箸置き              place to rest chopsticks on the table

渡す                  hand someone something

いただきます   Let's eat!

おかわり          seconds

ごちそうさま   Thank you for the food

替えます          substitute

おまわり          policeman

Japanese graded readers are da bomb

Now that I have them -- cool.  I am actually reading Japanese, and it's fun, and it's something I actually want to do!

Pics here, so you know what you're getting into.  Stories from level 0:  the Kimura family's morning (with Dad carrying out garbage and briefcase and throwing the wrong one in the dumpster); things you make with soybeans; Ryo-san the cop chasing a thieving Santa; the northward path of cherry blossoms in Japan each spring.  Level 2's cranked up in difficulty, and features:  Russian folk tales; some New York stories; the Japanese bath; Mt. Fuji.  A lot of variety and a lot of culture.  Some of the stories are sad and some quirky-funny and some don't quite excite, but there's still much to like.

They are pricey!  $20-$30 (~2000-3000円) for a pack of 5-6 booklets.  The cheapest is at CD Japan, currently around $21.

I've never been able to find them in electronic format, at least, not at the lower levels.  (I can't find again one I had at a higher level.)

So I've shifted away from kanji, despite only having some 40 left to go.  I'll now be posting vocabulary from the readers.  My lists aren't exhaustive:  I'm omitting things I already know or that are understandable from context.  And if you really need them, or need more, maybe you're reading at too high a level.. 見ましょう！

雑漢字2:揮動悔如鉢

掌, palm of hand/control:  尚, esteem, is derived from the face of a building (saving face?); put this with hand to get the face of the hand, that is, the palm, which helps you control thing.

宴, banquet:                     Banquet is provided by hostess in a sunny room (essentially Henshall's mnemonic).

紛, confusion/go astray:  Slice threads and they'll go astray and cause confusion (again, Henshall).

詰, packed/rebuke:          Lucky words?  Pack 'em in, and rebuke the naysayers!

詳, detailed/full report:   Give a detailed, full report about sheep.
抵, touch/resist/reach:    If you're going to resist, reach with your hand down low (as in 低) -- that is, you gotta get messy.
拓, clear (land):              Put your hands down to get out the rocks.
挿, insert:                       The thing on the right is a mortar and pestle, but it sure doesn't look like one.  Henshall and Kanshudo.com both suggest taking it as a thousand somethings.  I'll go with Henshall:  Hand inserts a thousand items per day.

極, poles (extremes):     Complicated.  I'll echo Henshall (with alterations).  Someone stole a blankie! and is pushing by hand 又 that squiggly blankie into a gap 口 between two wooden 木 poles 二.  (It doesn't mean poles as in light poles, but we do what we can).
搾, press/wring:             Make 乍 hole 穴 by pressing with hand.  (Henshall again).
擁, hug/hold/protect:     Hand holds exotic bird in cage (that lid on top, with a thread-based mesh -- the middle thing -- as the cage itself). (Henshall with alterations.)

盾 (shield) Mr. Jun from the difficulty of kanji

盾, (じゅん) shield:    The border is a shield, and then there's the eye 目.  Henshall is unsure what the 十 means here.  Let's say it's a medieval European knight, so you've got the cross at the top of a shield of 3 levels (for the Trinity?), and an asymmetric shield border.
循, (じゅん) follow:  Crossroads plus shield... OK, so it's a dangerous crossroads.  To stay safe from bandit, follow the man with the shield.

盾循

乇, a rooted plant you can trust

乇は表外漢字です。It's supposed to be a plant taking root.  It means entrust, but we don't care.

託, entrust:     Words you can trust will take root in you?

宅, husband:   Someone the wife can trust, that lives under her roof.  (It may also help in remembering this to think of husbandry, as in, caring for things.)

詫, apologize:That old trope that the husband always has to apologize.

託宅詫

いたい！Thorns!

「朿」は表外漢字です。それは「thorn」を意味します。I see it as a plant 木 with hooks on it:  thorns.So we have:

策, policy/plan:  Write out with your bamboo (stylus) your plans to clear the thorns.  Or maybe:
                           Write out your plans to catch the golden fleece on a thorn bush.
刺, pierce/thorn:  A thorn is like a knife on a thorn bush, piercing you.

策刺

Today I'm giving ゆう grief :)

憂, (ゆう) grief:                 The head 頁 and heart 心 are smashed together by some
                                            trauma, causing you to walk slowly as you process your
                                            grief.
優, (ゆう) superior/actor:  It's initially apparently someone doing a slow ritual dance.
                                           But I'll say it as:  the superior person is one who processes
                                           his grief.

憂優

雑漢字1:揮動悔如鉢

These are 漢字 made of very common パーツ, so they either don't fit into groupings like I've made earlier, or the groupings would be huge.  So I'll just put them in arbitrary groups.

動, rut:            A rut this big has the power to capture any vehicle!

悔, regret:      Everyone feels regret for what has passed.

如, likeness:  What the woman sees when she looks in a (square) mirror.

鉢, bowl:        The original use for metal.  Maybe.
香, perfume:  The bottom was originally 甘 sweet, but got simplified.  The top is our familiar rice stalk.  So:  sweet fragrance of rice stalk released by baking in the sun.
添, add on:    This isn't the rice stalk.  First, we have a non-general-use character 忝, a man 天 with bowed head (the top bar tends to lean left a little) who's feeling 心 ashamed.  Then water.  I'll say:  the man feeling ashamed often adds on tears.

揮動悔如鉢

Graded readers

今、私は少し話したいです。先週日本語のgraded readersをもらいました。１組の本もうありました；３組のも来ました。
本当に高いです：セットあたり＄２８ぐらいです。でも、私はそれを読むことができます、それからすこし楽しいです。色々な話がありあす。多分面白い；時々じゃない。
もうですね。I am temporarily giving up (mostly) on talking, because I'm always finding that I don't know how to say things even if I think I have the words.  If in Japanese you don't take medicine but drink it; 去る, despite being defined in jisho.org as "leave," isn't what you'd use for leaving a room (a kind commenter pointed this out when I was trying to write those Dad at the Zoo stories), I'm just going to have to have a lot more 日本語 coming in before I can trust my mind to generate the right turns of phrase.  I expect it's the same between languages generally:  knowing which prepositions to use; whether to take, make, go, or do something (make time/go wrong/etc).

Yet another 頁

Kanji Portraits does have a page on, well, pages 頁 (the 部首 for head, but as a standalone it means page), but for whatever reason only includes 頁順顔頭願.  There are たくさん漢字 with this 部首.  Maybe one day I'll do the rest.

領, territory/chief:     令 is order/rule and 頁, page, is the radical for head.  The head of the rule of a territory is its chief.
頃, time.                     After sufficient time, a man will slump over 匕, especially his head (with sleep).
傾, lean/slant:             Person here to emphasize it's the person with the slump, not the time, that we're focusing on.
頒, divide/distribute:  分 is divide; a divided mind is divided indeed.  So maybe it does distributed processing, like a computer with lots of CPU's?
顕, visible/exposure.  We've seen this before.  Though the etymology's wrong, the thing on the lower left can be something like stand or line up.  When people stand in line in the sun, their heads should still be visible.
頻, recur/frequent:      The two components are 歩 and 頁, so despite its actual evolution (which involves rippling water), I'll say:  walk and you'll frequently and recurringly bob your head.

領頃傾頒顕頻(頁順顔頭願)

More 戊

More now of that long-armed halberd 戊. 

威, authority/threaten:  The woman that has or is a battleaxe (halberd; or maybe she's carrying it over her had as that horizontal line) has some mighty threatening authority. (Don't blame me for this metaphor; Henshall says that was a term of address from a bride to her mother-in-law.  Which no doubt made home life sweet and serene. 😲)
滅, destroy:                   The armies of Armageddon hacked with their halberds and battleaxes, and all was destroyed in fire and water.
茂, overgrown:             The grass/plants that thrust like a halberd wherever they like.
歳, years old:               Your age is roughly the time since your footprints 止 were taken and you were presented at the altar 示...until the current cutoff point, cut off (by the halberd?) right now.  OK, it's quite a stretch.  Henshall says it relates to jamming 歩 into that halberd somehow, but lordy.

威滅茂歳