Sayuri Saying, Miku Real Japanese talk with guests of any gender on their podcast or videos. They’re friends & so a lot of videos together too.
Hoshikaze (yuri author) vtubes regularly with 2 other yuri mangaka - anything from gaming to reading fan letters, telling love stories, etc
I listened to quite a bit of Let’s Learn Japanese from Small Talk. They give definitions of words in English a lot (which is a personal pet peeve – like, if you can understand the conversation otherwise, you should be able to explain words with Japanese synonyms or simple explanations, but I digress). They talk about cultural things about Japan or the UK (they were university students in London I believe), and are pretty easy to follow, even way before I started my intensive listening last year.
Most of the podcasts I like tend to be single person ones. Although Yuyu did just start a podcast with a female co-host about gaming (ゲームで日本語) that I’ve listened to a few episodes of and enjoyed, if half of the hosts being women is good enough 
(Re: さ being masculine.)
I wonder if there is a regional bias/aspect to it too? I live in a more rural part of Japan and I hear it a looot from both men and women. My main association is my middle school students (especially girls) using it(「せんせーい、私はさ、本文を読もうとしたんだけどさ…何もわかんないよ！」), but that being said, I definitely hear older people use it too
Might be. It’s also possible I was overstating, cuz of his speech style (not 言い方, but like mannerisms, intonation, demeanor). I know in anime I’ve heard it used by both genders - but I try not to generalize anime to real life too much.
Tbh I think the “blunt/gentle” dichotomy is probably more useful than “masculine/feminine”. I’ll have to pay attention for it next time I’m listening to some podcasts. I know my (female) teacher doesn’t use it - but her speech style is more polite/gentle anyway. My other (male) teacher’s style sounds similar to YuYu’s
Pupils that use タメ口 with their teacher, will also use さ, which intermediate Tobira characterizes as very colloquial.
I didn’t think about these two because I usually associate them with their solo videos/podcasts. 
I’ll check them out too!
Good enough for me. 
I remember in Satori Reader, they said that さ as a filler word (like 私はさ、) it’s what to say when it’s not that you don’t know what to say, but you’re trying to think of the best way to say it.
Now I owe Luna a letter so I’ll get to that. 
Time for an update! I’ve actually had family in town, so not a super amount of time for study or reading.
What I’ve been reading
I finished up たまごの魔法屋トワ 1 | L19. It was cute and easy. I’m probably not going to continue with the series because of the lack of kanji.
And continuing with trying to review/grade some of the lower purple books while they’re still my reading level, I started 魔女の診療所 こまったコ、大集合!? | L20?? which uh… is definitely NOT an L20 book. It’s not impossible for me to read, but it’s somewhat harder than the other books I’ve read so far. I might start another book in the L21-L22 range and alternate chapters so I don’t burn out on this one.
I decided to take a peak at ざつ旅-That's Journey- 1 | L24 last night and ended up reading until I was so tired my eyes refused to focus. 
What I’ve been watching
Finished 安達としまむら S1 | L25 which I did not enjoy. In future, I will be taking everyone’s advice and dropping stuff after 4 episodes if I’m not having a good time with it. Life is too short to watch bad anime.
I started スーパーカブ S1 | L22 this week. So far I’m liking it, but it’s super slow paced.
Kanji Study
I rebooted my kanji study recently. Previously, I was using an app, but after about 500 kanji I was feeling frustrated with having to study the way the app wanted. 
Currently, I’ve been using a combo of Kodansha Kanji Learner’s Course and Kanji in Context, with ringotan for practicing how to write.
KKLC gets into what they call the “graphemes” of each kanji and how to SEE the meaning of each kanji. I’m liking it much better than mnemonics. A big con with this book is that it really doesn’t teach you the kanji in an order that’s good if you want to get into reading as fast as you can.
KIC is great for teaching vocab for each reading of the kanji, including some non-standard readings as well. However, it doesn’t really get into how to recognize kanji at all.
Plus ringotan is just an srs app for drawing kanji. The mascot apple thing is a little creepy though.
It’s a lot slower this way, but so far it’s feeling like time well spent. I can usually review 3-ish pages of KKLC a week (read the KKLC entry + add all the vocab words into my bunpro deck + add the vocab for the corresponding KIC entry). Unless I’m starting yet another book about a 10 or 12 year old and I’m pining to read something for adults, then I might be inspired to work on my kanji a bit more.
Until next time… またね！
While I remember liking the order in Henshall’s kanji book better back then, I don’t think there really is such a thing as what you’re describing - there’s just too much variability in books (or other materials). ちなみに there are the The KLC Graded Reading Sets • Kanji Learner's Course Official Site which are meant so you can start reading right away… but you’re probably past the point where they’d be useful
とにかく sounds like you’ve got a great approach going. 頑張ってね 
While there isn’t a perfect order in which to learn kanji, I think some are better than others (assuming the goal was to start consuming Japanese written media as soon as possible). Or at least, if I was starting from scratch, I think I’d feel frustrated that this book goes through the kanji in a way that builds on their graphemes instead of based on how common a given kanji is.
I’m just not one of those people that can read all of Remembering the Kanji before even cracking open a Japanese book.
Anyway, at this point I’m kind of resigned that it’s probably going to be a while before I hit the 1000-or-so kanji before I can read comfortably without furigana, but it’s okay because that gives me time to build up more vocab.
As someone who came to Japanese waaay before the idea of learning kanji in frequency order to read faster was a thing, I kinda just think as long as you’re not going through a system that’s giving you words like 旬 and 貝 because they’re easy to remember (looking at you, Heisig), in my opinion you’ll be exposed to the first 1000 so many times you’ll just learn them through reading.
That’s a good point. I think holistically, I like the grapheme approach. It’s just, you know, I have to read the whole darn book to make the most of it.
Anyway, I just had a stress out a few days ago that I’m TRYING to take the N4 in December and this isn’t in anything resembling JLPT order. But also, realistically, I’m already reading and watching N3 level stuff, so if the JLPT is actually a test of Japanese skill (and not how well I studied for the JLPT), I should be fine.
(Also sorry Luna I think my original response to you came off way more harsh than I meant it to, so I tried to tone it down a little. 
)
My point though is that an abstract “how common is this kanji” list doesn’t necessarily correlate at all to anything you’re actually trying to read.
I ran into plenty of supposedly uncommon kanji way more than many common ones, when I was earlier on in my reading. The only time I think kanji frequency is particularly useful is: 1. Something specifically tailored to what you’re reading (like jpdb decks). 2. Knowing that a kanji is uncommon to the point of irrelevance (ex: 吃驚 for びっくり)… That’s just me tho
Fwiw I flipped through the first 200 kanji in KKLC, and they’re almost all kanji I see constantly. And as @shitsurei said, you’re gonna learn a ton of them just by reading anyway
I’m pretty sure most of us aren’t
Yeah, that’s just the nature of the thing. It’s a slow climb up a loooong mountain
What order do you have Ringotan in? They do have a JLPT order
Nor sure I saw it, but no worries.
I definitely watched a youtube video about how some guy had reached N1 in like two years and started off by reading all of RTK and I could only think “Could not be me”. I could not think of a way to make me lose enthusiasm for learning Japanese faster.
That being said, I think it’s neat there’s so many ways to learn Japanese.
My 富士山
That’s a good idea too. When it gets closer to December, if I’m still worried about it, I can switch to JLPT order.
Now to decide if I want to read about witches or Yotsuba before bed… またね！
Another day… another session with my tutor. I think because both of us were going to eat after that session, we just ended up talking about food the whole time. I still find it useful to brainstorm a list of conversation topics before, even if we don’t end up talking about anything on my list. I guess it puts me in the right mindset.
I need to write reviews for all the stuff I’ve read recently.
Looks like you two were quite hungry 
Was it easy to talk about food? I struggle with food-related vocabulary and in addition to talking I find it hard reading menues in Japanese with all the strangely (?) or overly used kanji
It wasn’t too bad. I like talking about food. We were comparing the appliances in our kitchens and I impressed my tutor that I have a bread maker and make bread about once a week. At least since it was conversation practice, I didn’t have to worry about complicated kanji for all the variety of fish one finds at a sushi restaurant/etc.
Fish vocab always cracks me up, but I take it as a learning experience at times, tho I’m less likely to look it up than flowers, plants, or trees. Flowers I always look up. Plants & trees, depends on my mood.
Update time!
What I’ve been reading
Still chugging along on 魔女の診療所 こまったコ、大集合!? | L20?? so far the plot seems very “kids these days with their technology, I mean MAGIC, don’t understand the value of a hard day’s work!” Am I supposed to learn that doing unpaid labor shoveling horse poop is good for me actually?
Finished books 2 & 3 of よつばと! And it’s Yotsuba, it’s cute and a quick, easy read.
Also finished ざつ旅-That’s Journey- (review) and 魔法少女ダンデライオン (review). I mostly read ざつ旅 because I wanted to learn the travel related vocab. And I loved 魔法少女ダンデライオン and I really want more people to read it so I can talk about it with someone.
Currently reading 赤ずきんチャチャ 4 (りぼんマスコットコミックス 759 ) | L18 but will probably finish very soon. Unfortunately, I’ve been reading too much on my phone and I’ve given myself eye strain so I’ve had to slow down my reading a bit.
Not sure what I’ll read next. Continue with a new volume of ニッターズハイ! or read something new.
What I’ve been watching
I kind of took a break from watching a ton of anime to catch up on my backlog of youtube language learning videos.
I did manage to finish スーパーカブ S1 | L22. I think I’d like reading the manga more. The show has really loooong stretches that’s nothing but Koguma on her super cub and then my mind would wander… and I’d find myself grabbing my phone and not watching the show.
I started 乙女ゲームの破滅フラグしかない悪役令嬢に転生してしまった… S1 | L25 because I kind of love hamefura. Even though I’ve seen it before with English subs, it’s a bit more of a challenge than I’d expected.
Other stuff
I got a shipping notice for something quite exciting, so I’ll share here when it arrives. Mweheheh.
Until next time… またね！
I’ve started and stopped the first LN like 4 times already, but now you’re making me want to get back to the anime… I did just finish a series yesterday so maybe I can slot it in as one of the 17 shows (only kinda kidding) that I’m currently watching.
The cover and art style look kind of interesting… I’m only reading books I already own for the next month, but I added it to my wishlist
The nice thing is - once you watch one or two of these, they all get easier, cuz you get used to all the aristocrat language
Funny that’s my Currently Watching number too… wanna make it 18 together? 
