My new addiction

When I decided to take this whole writing thing seriously, I needed to find ways to carve out the time to write every day. The first thing I gave up was television. Not much loss there. I still watch episodes of shows like Buffy, Angel, or Lost when they come out on DVD while I'm treading the mill, but aside from that it's just an hour of Adult Swim on Sunday nights and basketball when it's on (and I usually do something else like knit at the same time).

The second thing I gave up was video games. This one was actually harder, and it's the thing that still calls to me when I'm struggling with the words. Lara Croft beckons. I remember that I never did play Final Fantasy Tactics all the way to the end. Or Baldur's Gate, for that matter. Then I hear about cool games like the Sims, and I long for more hours in the day.

But mostly I keep those urges under control. Until last week...

As you all know, I homeschool my boys. I'm currently in a tricky phase where Oliver has started doing real school, but Aidan is not quite capable of working independently. I feel like Aidan is missing out on things I'd like to be doing with him but can't because there isn't enough time in the day. I wish he could do things without me, but how I can I make sure he's progressing with something if I'm not monitoring him?

Enter Rosetta Stone. This is the foreign language program that's pretty much universally hailed to be the best in homeschooling circles. To actually buy the program is over $200, but I recently found out that with a library card you can get it for free from the library's web page. It's considered a reference material. Now, Aidan has been learning Latin, which he loves but which happens to be very time consuming and is generally the thing we are most likely not to get to on a given day. It's a shame because he loves it, and yet it's not likely to appear on his standardized tests, hence the leaving it for last if at all. I decided to check out the Rosetta Stone Latin, to see if it was at a level he could do on his own.

First I did a few lessons in Latin, and they were perfect for Aidan. But I soon forgot that's what I was even there for. It was so addictive, just clicking on pictures, saying things out loud to yourself, and before you know it you've learned a bunch of Latin. It was like a video game, really. But I've already taught myself enough Latin to already know everything that Rosetta Stone has to offer. Not much fun there for me.

But look, there's Chinese! I never progressed far with Chinese. I tried an audio tape series that worked the same way as Rosetta Stone, no phrases to memorize, you learn words by figuring out what's being said just like a child learns his native language, etc. It was good, but I'm not an audio learner, I'm a visual learner. Rosetta Stone, with the added visual element of seeing the words written, is perfect for me.

After four lessons in Chinese I remember that I don't really have a reason to learn Chinese (aside from it's just cool). So I looked at what other languages they offer. I've been working on Icelandic lately since it's the closest to Old Norse (see how cleverly I disguise my addiction as "novel research"?). No Icelandic on Rosetta Stone. No Norwegian either. But they do have Swedish, which is a lot like Icelandic (kind of like French is a lot like Spanish).

So it's a week later and I've done about fifteen lessons in Swedish. Which I don't really need, since I decided not to use foreign phrases in the novel, and I'll most likely never travel to Sweden. And yet I can't stop. But there is an upside. It's become my writing reward. My goal for a long time has been to write at least 1000 words a day. Now, when I get my 1000 words done, I let myself learn some Swedish.

Yep, I'm one sad little puppy.