flying kanji
Well, it’s time to write a post, now that I have free time, and no job, since my workplace liquidated.
I’ve been spending lots of time studying Kanji and Japanese Grammar. Using a DS for Kanji study is excellent, my game of choice is Nazotte Oboeru Otona no Kanji Renshuu ) (なぞって覚える大人の漢字練習).
The hardest thing about Kanji practice is that most of the words have no conceptual attachment. Even if you understand one of the Kanji, having context of the sample sentence or word is necessary to help memorize the different readings of the Kanji. Since most of the DS games are made for native Japanese speakers, this is a problem for non-natives using it for study.
Still, digging through it with a dictionary at hand is pretty good, and you expand your vocabulary while memorizing the readings of the Kanji. There seems to be a lot of transformations of the pronunciations of a Kanji that are not actually listed in the dictionary, but where the pronunciation changes due to surrounding sounds — this is probably much easier if you can find and learn the linguistic-based reasons for these changes.
I have a small book on Japanese Linguistics, it’s helps provide some understanding of various things that you see in the language which do not immediately make sense. For example, you may have heard Japan referred to as ‘Nippon’ (にっぽん) on occasion, instead of ‘Nihon’ (にほん). The book explains that the geminate is used for emphasis, and, for reasons I forget, the consonant becomes voiced, making Nippon a stronger name for Japan in some way. This may have been a misinterpretation, but it made sense at the time. 
In any case, linguistics provides alot of restrictions and rules that help you restrict the ambiguity of written language by understanding the elements of speech and how it applies to the present language, or perhaps even moreso, the formation of the language through history.
I’ve started doing some Japanese lessons online at Japanese Online Institute. The lessons are pretty cheap (5-9USD per 50min lesson), and the teachers speak entirely in Japanese except at the most basic class levels. It’s definitely good for alot of listening practice for basic speech elements. I’d highly recommend it as a study supplement, but not as an entire study system. The downsides are having multiple people in a class (although sometimes you get one on your own, yay) which means you dividing speaking time between all students (usually 2-4 in there). Even so, this can provide some interesting insight into seeing where other people’s skills lie, and which things they can have trouble comprehending compared to your own understanding. Paying attention to this provides a small benefit.
The biggest downside is that you are unable to control your own study material. Doing face-to-face lessons with a private teacher elsewhere, I’ve been able to direct the study curriculum and found that to be far more efficient for grammar understanding. After about 12 hours of lessons, I’ve settled on studying grammar externally (through Tae Kim’s exceedingly awesome Japanese Guide), and then constructing a long series of questions based on new grammar points that I’ve learned, as well as a few review questions on previous material. Keeping the lesson to primarily asking these questions, and being corrected along the way, seems to be the most efficient method I’ve found so far.
I think I’m getting close to being able to take the JLPT 4 test, as much as I’m uninterested in having a certification, it might be useful when in Japan, just for explaining where I’m at with the language easier. Perhaps a few weeks after arriving I’ll look into taking it.
Probably going to look into teaching English a bit while in Japan, and finding some programming on the side to satisfy that need. Teaching English would probably be useful for understanding language acquisition and latin-based languages a bit more. Picking up a latin-based language after Japanese is tempting, because it would be alot simpler, although there are some other quite interesting languages around with novel structure and large differences to English.