How do I see progress?

 I have a friend who does a little Duolingo everyday.  She has been doing this for about 3 years.  She does her minimum goal for XP and goes on with her life.  Over the past three years, her Spanish has improved dramatically.

I started Duolingo at the same time she did.  I got a streak of about 12 days and stopped for three years.  I thought Duolingo was boring.  So while I was doing other things my friend was progressing baby step by baby step toward being able to understand and speak Spanish.

I have a 52-day streak in Duolingo.  This is a record for me for doing almost anything of my own accord.  I plan to follow my friend's example of doing some everyday even if it is the bare minimum for meeting my XP goal of 30 points or two lessons.

It feels so hard to remember what I'm learning.  My community college class uses TPRS which is a story-making method.  I get annoyed at how stupid the stories are sometimes, but I remember a lot from the classes.  

When I read stories aimed at level A1 sometimes there is a lot I don't understand.  It can be very frustrating.  Then, I just want to binge YouTube--and not in Spanish!

Today, I went to a Duolingo travel event about Lake Titicaca.  The host asked us which part of the word was more offensive to English-speakers.  The consensus was "caca," but the host told us that to Bolivian and Peruvian people the word "titi" was more offensive.  If I remember correctly, titi means puma, and caca means mountain.  This is the lake of the Puma Mountain.

If you are looking for a fun read, I enjoyed Hola Lola.  I have Kindle Unlimited so I am reading for free.  I have tried several, but this one was fun.  One caveat, the story just ends without resolving.  If you want the continuation of the story you'll have to read Un Hombre Fascinante.