Ruby the Hard Way: Early Going

I did not have a ton of time to work tonight, but I made sure to get in some exercise even though I was not deeply feeling it.  This is about the time when I would normally start to feel like I want to do something else or get bored with this mission, so I am trying extra hard to remain committed!  I went through the fist 5 lessons in Ruby the Hard Way and here are my initial thoughts:

(1) Very hard not to read fast, skip stuff, and not do it the hard way.  Shaw has you on some seriously rote stuff especially early on.  I am trying to respect the process and not cheat.  I am typing in every last comment and doing all of it even if it at times seems inane.

(2) I am counting on this to continue!  One of my problems is that I do not type in the commands or use them enough and then I am presented with a situation and I end up stumped before I even start because I am scrambling trying to remember basic syntax.  I think Shaw's book will help me drill the syntax a bit harder.

(3) It is hard to go back over things you feel like you understand, but to be honest I still make so many basic mistakes that this is clearly needed.

(4) I love the format of the book, it is very straightforward, nicely written, and follows a predictable repetitive pattern.

Early returns are good, but then they almost always are.  I will reserve judgement (praise or critiques) for the later chapter when I see if Shaw is more successful than Code Academy or Pine at teaching me some of the more advanced methods.  It's also true that repetition is required to learn so even if Shaw does unlock the next level for me, I probably always needed to do the previous work to get to this point (if that makes sense?).

Total hours into Programming: 58.5 (1.5 yesterday)
My Text game: 2 hours, 107 lines

Progress on Shaw's Learning Ruby the Hard Way: Finished Exercise 1-5

TreeHouse (105 Points) Code Academy Points: 564
Code Academy Badges: 59

Code Academy Skills Finished: 2 (Make a Website, Ruby)

Progress on Hartl's Tutorial Ready to start Chapter 3! 

Books Finished:

Chris Pine's Learn to Program 8/9/2015