Thanks Warpwind for doing the technical thing. I have a nasty habit of forgetting things that I'm not actively studying, and goodness knows how long it ould have taken for me to remember that.
On the subject of spelling mistakes, as a science student who could easily have done English should I have chosen, I find the general lack of basic fluency in the writing of most scientists really, really annoying. They cover up poor sentence structuring and spelling skills with technical vocabulary and expect everyone else to figure out what they mean
I learnt French until I was 14 or so, and then forgot it. I did German until I was 16, then forgot most of it. I'm pretty good with languages, but again, unless I'm actively learning and using them I slip. I've been doing spoken Japanese for a year or so now on a one hour tuition per week basis, casually, and it seems good so far. We finished Japanese for Busy People 1 (damn good textbook to start on, btw), and someday I'll go back and do the written language too. The worst thing about the basics of the language in my opinion is the numbers. I kind of think in numbers a lot of the time, but basic system for the natural numbers + hitotsu system for ennumeration + irregular dates + all the rest confuses me.
I liked it quite a bit, and with practice I nailed down hiragana/katakana quite easily. Japanese grammar, once you get a good grasp of it, I thought was a breeze. Except the massive verb endings - some of those were tough on occasion. As for the - "natural numbers + hitotsu system for ennumeration + irregular dates + all the rest confuses me" - hehe, I can see what you mean, we had a lot of people in our class absolutely getting slaughtered by that whole thing. One reason it was easy for me - prior experience. Another reason - I practice these numbers every time I work out 
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