Man, how did I miss this reply? Sorry.

It would seem I'm now able to read a lot of the texts that were previously just slightly too difficult. Namely, I can zip right through the low-level Chinese Breeze graded readers, the Mandarin Companion stuff, and even some random Manga on the web... I'm able to make myself understood by native speakers, though I probably sound like a child in doing so. Actual novels, though, they make use of more complicated grammar and I spend more time puzzling over what the intended meaning is than actually reading the material.