The JLPT application form is one of the worst things I've ever had the displeasure of working my way through. It's clearly not meant for those who study on their own let alone for people who have lived in Japan compared to institutional study of the language. I have no idea how many hours I've "studied" the language. I "learned" because real life told me to either learn or I'd have no place to live. The literacy came from trying to read fanfics online and regular novels. Call it high-pressure osmotic learning if you will. You automatically start recognising characters and words after repeat exposure. (I'll also admit to sleeping on books (low-pressure osmotic learning?), but I don't think that was anywhere near as effective.) :P
Oh yeah! I don't know if the US page for Mighty Leaf shows the choco truffle teas yet, but I emailed them about when the teas would become available and they said they were hoping they'd come in sometime in Oct. (This is for the Canadian side. The teas were intro'd first in the US.) They said they'd email me when they came in, so hopefully I'll be hearing back from them about the teas. I can always hope. ^_^
Anyhow, time to sign off for the night. I'm going to try hunting down the paperback version of 屍鬼 (the novel I want to gain enough literacy to read) and see if it mightn't have a bit more furigana than the hardback version. I still don't have enough kanji to read this book comfortably. *sigh* At least I now have enough to understand why I had such a hard time reading the little verse before the actual prologue. >.>