I've been studying Japanese for an embarassingly long time. (The first lessons I took came with cassette tape pronunciation guides.) Every so often I help tutor people who want to start learning Japanese. You can see some samples of the materials I made for these tutoring sessions here (PDF). Right now I'm studying for the JLPT N3 exam, where kanji will be my main hurdle to cross.
If you're thinking of getting started learning Japanese, feel free to peruse this short list of advice and tools that I've compiled for beginning to intermediate level Japanese study.
One of my favorite ways to practice reading and (to a lesser extent) grammar is to translate song lyrics. With the recent release of Kingdom Hearts III, I decided to translate the themes to each of the main games (although there are plenty of wonderful translations elsewhere) and I'm working on more songs all the time. Some of these translations are a little opinionated, so I'll have to write some liner notes for them at some point. Here's what I've got online so far:
Men always pass through my thoughts without permission
Sadness is always waiting for someone to embrace it
Just like that maddening moon nestles close to the night