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edenfallingIntended to sleep in today and run errands in the afternoon -- it being my day off -- but GS is apparently sick with a fever, etc., and PM (the manager) called me at about 9am to ask if I could cover for him. So I was at work from 1-6pm, and there went my lovely naptime. *pouts*
On the bright side, at least one of my tax refunds seems to have come in, because otherwise there is no way to explain the sudden jump in my checking account balance. Yay! Now I can pay my rent for April and May, which was, for a while, looking like it might be damn near impossible.
I really need a better-paying job.
...
Do any people out there need editing advice on essays and whatnot, and if so, are you willing to pay me? I'm actually a very good editor -- I'm exhaustively thorough -- even though it drives me batty if I indulge too often.
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In a completely unrelated question, does Japanese ever use the consonant combination TS in front of any vowel other than U? Because I see the syllable TSU a lot, but I've never seen TSA, TSE, TSI, TSO, TSAO, etc.
ETA: Thank you to everyone who explained pieces of the Japanese syllabic system! (That stuff about appending Y syllables is absolutely fascinating, for example.)
On the bright side, at least one of my tax refunds seems to have come in, because otherwise there is no way to explain the sudden jump in my checking account balance. Yay! Now I can pay my rent for April and May, which was, for a while, looking like it might be damn near impossible.
I really need a better-paying job.
...
Do any people out there need editing advice on essays and whatnot, and if so, are you willing to pay me? I'm actually a very good editor -- I'm exhaustively thorough -- even though it drives me batty if I indulge too often.
--------------------------------------
In a completely unrelated question, does Japanese ever use the consonant combination TS in front of any vowel other than U? Because I see the syllable TSU a lot, but I've never seen TSA, TSE, TSI, TSO, TSAO, etc.
ETA: Thank you to everyone who explained pieces of the Japanese syllabic system! (That stuff about appending Y syllables is absolutely fascinating, for example.)
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*delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 02:41 am (UTC)"Tsu" appears because it is part of the Japanese syllable alphabet. It's in the "t" character line - ta, chi, tsu, te, to. (The T line contains two of the odd Japanese syllables, the other lines being S, which is sa, shi, su, se, so and H, which ha, hi, fu, he, ho) There are only really two other ways to get unusual combinations - one is the created syllables from joining a ya, yu, or yo to another syllable to create, for example, the sha, shu, and sho sounds. (When I say join, I mean that the ya/yu/yo is place at half-size next to the primary syllable) However, those always join to the "i" syllables in each line - ki, shi, chi, ri, hi, mi - for example, when combined with yo become - kyo, sho, cho, ryo, hyo, myo - respectively. I may be missing a line. So tsu, never joing with any, could never become any of those combinations.
The other strange way to form things is via katakana. It's how you can get a 'fa' sound - it's a normal fu with a small a next to it. But that only happens with katakana, as far as I've seen. So while it's remotely possible that it could happen...maybe...I've been studying abroad in Japan since september and can't think of ever seeing it.
Sorry for the length.
Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 02:50 am (UTC)Also "ji", I think. (I hear "fu" pronounced kind of like "fhu", kind of like how the 'r' sound is really between 'r' and 'l', so does that one count as being strange?)
Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 05:56 am (UTC)The other one that I'm a little proud of myself for figuring out is the Japanese 'R' sound - it requires convincing your tongue to pronounce an 'L' and your vocal chords to pronounce an 'R' at the same time... Interestingly, more gutteral (ie, English-like) pronounciations are apparently associated with Yakuza. Compare, say, Gamabunta and Kakashi sometime...
Ja, -n
Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 01:47 pm (UTC)On Yakuza Slang:
yachimae - equiv. to korose, or I'll kill you
yabai - that's bad
ending things with 'e' - uruse, although that bleed into command form, which is considered yakuza-ish anyway.
...and yes, I just asked my Japanese host family what Yakuza speech was like.
It makes reading manga in Japanese a lot more interesting, I think, because a lot of that doesn't translate well, or really at all.
Oh god the "r" and "l" sounds. I've had friends who've done JET who've spent classes and more on that pronounciation difference.
Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 06:06 am (UTC)Except for the pure vowels (a, e, u, i, o) and, IIRC, the 'Y' and 'R' lines, all of the various kana can appear in either voiced or unvoiced modes - that is, an unvoiced 'ta' will sound and be written as exactly that, and a voiced 'ta' will have a mark at its upper right corner that looks damn near exactly like a Western quotation mark (") and be pronounced 'da'. Likewise, 'ka' --> 'ga', 'sa' --> 'za', and 'ha' can be voiced either normally, as 'ba', or with a little circle instead of the quotes, in which case it becomes 'pa'. 'Chi' and 'shi', for no reason I understand, are both voiced as 'ji', and I have no clue what 'tsu' comes out as.
It's not quite as complicated as it sounds, honest!
Ja, -n
Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 07:06 am (UTC)Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 01:29 pm (UTC)Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 07:59 pm (UTC)Thanks! -n
Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 03:17 am (UTC)Thanks for the lesson! I don't know much about syllabic systems, so this is very interesting for me.
Re: *delurks*
Date: 2006-04-15 01:34 pm (UTC)Pretty much all of what I know is direct from Japanese classes, and not from studying the linguistics themselves, sadly. They're very interesting in their own right.