Hi everybody, this is Joel Zarate. In this brief message, I want to let you know that I am taking a break until the end of August, or the first week of September. I usually take June and July off to spend time with family and friends and prepare new episodes across the podcast. However, this year, 2024, at the end of July... I'm having a surgery and I might need a couple of weeks to get things ready for it and a few weeks to recover. I suffer from a rare ear illness.
And the surgery is hopefully going to help me with that. But I might need physical therapy after that. So I'm giving myself enough time to recover. I also suffer from... a condition called chronic tinnitus which is a ringing sound that I permanently hear according to the American Tinnitus Association about 10% of adult Americans suffer from some level of tinnitus from very mild to very severe and debilitating. Mine is very loud and affects my short-term memory.
my ability to focus and concentrate, and it is like being sleep deprived permanently. And the reason why I am sharing this with you guys is because... Some of you have emailed me or messaged me to tell me about errors I made, like forgetting to leave the link to a transcript on a given episode or having an incorrect link. and taking you to a different transcript that corresponds to another episode, some misspellings and little things like that that some of you have found.
So, if you find mistakes like that, please let me know and I'll fix it. With your help, I can iron out those mistakes and I do appreciate when you tell me... and help me to polish what I create for you to learn Spanish. Now, since the podcast keeps growing... I'm getting more and more messages and emails. And I don't have a team to help me to manage all of that. So if you contact me, I might not be able to respond to you right away. But I'll do my best.
to at least say thank you so that you know that I read your message. Lastly, I would like to thank every single one of you who has donated to my GoFundMe to support the podcast. To those of you... who have emailed me to share with me how much the podcast has helped you. It is always very rewarding to hear from you how much the podcast has helped you. Llegué también lo que compartiste sobre tu viaje de aprender en español. Así que gracias a todos los que compartieron conmigo tu experiencia.
Your journey learning Spanish and it makes me very happy to hear how the podcast has helped you in your journey to speak and improve your Spanish. Also, I might share a message or two. with all of you between now and the end of August because I am also working on a new short novel and it might be ready by the end of July. I'll let you know about it if you would like to get my new novel. Also, I think our dear...
Alba Sanchez is planning a new immersion experience, a new immersion program in September in Segovia, Spain. And if she would like to share something about it with you, she might. share a message with you here in the podcast. All right. I hope that everything goes well with my surgery. There are always risks. going through a delicate surgery, but I feel confident that I'll be fine and hopefully I'll be back by the end of August or the first week of September.
Thank you everybody. I hope to be back at the end of August. Nos vemos muy pronto, queridos escuchas, queridos estudiantes. Que disfruten el verano. Y hasta pronto. Adiós.