hehehe
you sound like me during my second year of nihongo classes
stick with it.. it's not THAT bad.. I have an ex who is japanese and was born and raised there, and even she cant read all the characters.. It's all about memorization, and seeing the little "pictures" in the Kana..
Hell if you can learn Kanji, you can even read some Mandarin characters.. You know.. since the Japanese stole the written language from the Chinese and all