In a new language you’ll be less funny and less smart for a while. That’s the toll for getting a whole second voice.

Humour and precision are the last things to arrive in a language, because both depend on having spare capacity while you speak. For a long stretch you will be a flatter, slower version of yourself, saying the simple thing because the good thing is out of reach. That version is not who you are; it is the fee for building a whole second way of speaking.

Expect to be dull for a while and keep speaking anyway. Learn two or three phrases that let you stay in a conversation while you think. The wit comes back last, and it does come back.