Sounds good I'm halfway through the tae Kim book so I'll check out genki next. Maybe I'm just not retaining the info since I'm ADD idk... Say you said you are a truck driver, from Tennessee. Do you look like a truck driver from Tennessee..? Flannels, bushy beard, can of chew, etc..?
Being someone that passed N5 last year and just recently (Sunday) took N4. I suggest you're going about this the wrong way. If you haven't passed N5 you really shouldn't be studying much kanji at all. You really need an understanding of grammar and how Japanese works on a basic level before you're really going to understand Kanji at all. Then as Mike has suggested you need a logical approach to learning the Kanji. Otherwise you're just going to end up confusing yourself.