Check-in post

[mothwing]

Good morning, everyone! I hope you are all still doing well.

I'm a teacher in home office, so I've got a large pile of exams here to keep me company and students e-mailing me questions to make me feel like I'm working. Other than that my natural state already is self-isolation so not much changed, which is kind of making me rethink my life style choices.

I've taken up a knitting project and I'm learning how to Morse Code. What pursuits have you taken up to keep you busy?

if you feel lonely, why not go over and check in on the Covid Coffee Corner.

Comments

[therealsnape]

Oh, the resident little gnome will look so adorable in that hat!

[mothwing]

She does. :D

[ysilme]

I'll do the next check-up post tomorrow.

Awww, that hat is adorable! Learning Morse code is cool, too. I started it at some time but didn't get very far, it's been just one thing too many to do. But I urgently need to get back to my language learning, I haven't even done vocabulary since over two weeks!
We're doing well over here, and I'm more busy than I care for. *g* On the other hand, no time to get bored!

[mothwing]

It used to be my grandfather's hobby, so this is probably my tenth or eleventh attempt, but it's going well with that app so far.

My language learning's been on hold for three years, though I really miss my DGS days. Which language are you working on?

[ysilme]

Glad to hear the app is working well for you! Back at the beginning of High School, my maths teacher was an amateur radio operator. During a 10-day-school trip to Alsace we took daily hikes to some odd mountain or hill with nothing there but good radio reception, which bored us to death. *g* But I was intrigued by the radio thing, and have wanted to learn Morse code since then. That app trial was my first attempt, though.
What is DGS?
I'm currently learning Swedish as main language, online through Babbel. It works really well - I'd done two beginner's classes at the Volkshochschule before, but never was able to finish either due to RL circumstances, and snapped up a bit while travelling as well as through Lucia and mittsummer festivals of the Swedish community in the next large town. We both started it as back then, we dreamed of emigrating to Sweden. Still do, in a way, although it's much less likely these days due to Siljan's mother. I only really started to make progress when I started online learning. By now I have a yearly subscription for all of their languages, and am doing bits of others on the side - I'm doing the English and French classes to brush up my grammar and complete my vocabulary, and am attempting to increase my very basic knowledge of Italian, Spanisch, and Russian. Apart from being able to use Swedish for everyday's use my main motivation is also keeping mentally fit and training my memory since I have issues with my short-term memory. In Swedish, I've nearly finished A2, or had nearly finished; but they completely revamped the course and now I'm lacking larger chunks of the earlier levels which I'm now catching up with again.
Which language(s) are you working on?

[mothwing]

DGS is German sign language and I really enjoyed that. The classes were so quiet and it's SO. HANDY. to know. It enables you quickly exchange information above noise or when you're talking on the phone. And of course allows you to be prepared for future hearing loss and talk to deaf or hard of hearing people.

Crocky took three years of Swedish at uni, it always looked like fun. I took a year of Russian at Uni in Glasgow, tried to brush it up with a VHS course, but have forgotten most of it since. Now, I'm duolingoing my way through basic Welsh, and that's the only thing, really. I gave Swedish a go, but did not make it very far.

I'm strongly considering learning Spanish because it looks easy when my students work on it in self-directed learning lessons and Norwegian, because Warrior's father is Norwegian and his girlfriend, a very good friend of Crocky's, emigrated there, too, and we're visiting them regularly, so it might be handy to know.

Whoops, hit reply too soon. How does the Babble course work? In theory, I really enjoy online learning, but find it very hard to motivate myself and find that progress is often slow and erratic with duolingo.

[mithrial]

Such a cute little hat. What a fab project.
I just know SOS in morse. ---...--- or is it ...---...? Perhaps I don't know?

[mothwing]

---...--- is right! And ---..--- used to be the standard ringtone for SMS for obvious reasons on the old Nokias. I didn't know any more than that, either.

[mithrial]

My cousin used to be a ham radio geek. He taught me a bit but it's gone from my memory now.
At least we knew the most important call in a storm . 😄

[mothwing]

OOh, which one's that? Our storms are not that bad, but it might come in handy in these endtimes yet, who knows.

[mithrial]

No - just any storm in general. I was thinking of ships sending out the SOS.
Hopefully we wont need it in the present virus trouble. Most of us are grounded all around the world. Very strange times.