Cool that you're getting some good results with UsagiSpoon. That was also my onramp to jp. I found it really helpful and I followed it exactly, but I would say that rinsing 3 Cure Dolly episodes a day while taking detailed notes can be a bit much. The videos are dense, and my experience was that with an early beginner vocabulary and likely 0 reading experience there is quite a lot of info that you won't retain. 2 months after finishing UsagiSpoon I started going back through some of the Cure Dolly videos 1-a-day, reading the notes I had taken during my first viewing of them before and after each video, and I found that I retained a lot more.
I have a couple of unsolicited suggestions on ways you can try to mitigate how much time it takes:
1. Watch the Cure Dolly videos sped up (she speaks so slowly) and instead of writing notes when there is a table or some important visual info, just take a screenshot and add it to your notes).
2. Leave the subtitle tutor-method as soon as you feel like you can attempt it. I waited maybe like 4 months to do this and once I stopped watching eps with english subs first, I regretted not doing so sooner.Sure, you lose some comprehensibility, but also, you gain double the immersion time. Also something about always watching the same ep twice can be quite demotivating. You can also try rewatching an anime that you've already seen or one where you've read the source material, which will boost the comprehensibility without having to watch it twice. If you can pick a series that you can find jp subs for, that also helps. Regardless, leaving the subtitle tutor method does feel very daunting at first, but just like starting reading, waiting until you feel completely "ready" to leave the subtitle tutor method can slow your growth. One way to ween yourself off of it is to read the english subtitles from the .srt or .ass file since really all you want from the english viewing of the ep is the dialogue. Another weening technique is to watch the first half of the ep with english subs, turn them off for the second half, and then watch the episode again but no subs in first half and eng subs in the second half (still takes as much time as sub-tutor but gets you used to exerperiencing the eps without any english reference and keeps you motivated throughout the 50 min since you save your fluent understanding of the 2nd half of the ep for the end).
I have a couple of unsolicited suggestions on ways you can try to mitigate how much time it takes:
1. Watch the Cure Dolly videos sped up (she speaks so slowly) and instead of writing notes when there is a table or some important visual info, just take a screenshot and add it to your notes).
2. Leave the subtitle tutor-method as soon as you feel like you can attempt it. I waited maybe like 4 months to do this and once I stopped watching eps with english subs first, I regretted not doing so sooner.Sure, you lose some comprehensibility, but also, you gain double the immersion time. Also something about always watching the same ep twice can be quite demotivating. You can also try rewatching an anime that you've already seen or one where you've read the source material, which will boost the comprehensibility without having to watch it twice. If you can pick a series that you can find jp subs for, that also helps. Regardless, leaving the subtitle tutor method does feel very daunting at first, but just like starting reading, waiting until you feel completely "ready" to leave the subtitle tutor method can slow your growth. One way to ween yourself off of it is to read the english subtitles from the .srt or .ass file since really all you want from the english viewing of the ep is the dialogue. Another weening technique is to watch the first half of the ep with english subs, turn them off for the second half, and then watch the episode again but no subs in first half and eng subs in the second half (still takes as much time as sub-tutor but gets you used to exerperiencing the eps without any english reference and keeps you motivated throughout the 50 min since you save your fluent understanding of the 2nd half of the ep for the end).