I don’t write very much in summer anymore. Each June, I realize that the only way I was ever able to be productive was because somebody else was watching my kids.

This summer, I had the kids in summer camp for about 3 hours a day, time I’d use to hit the gym and run errands, rinse and repeat. However, that all changed when Otakon came around. I signed up for 10 hours of coverage at the convention for Anime News Network—and ended up writing an interview for Anime Herald as well!

I’m not sure if I’m out of practice or what, but as soon as I left Otakon on Sunday, I was bedridden with a high fever for two days! When I woke up, I wrote like the wind to get my write-ups done before our family vacation the following week. In those days I realized that with proper motivation, I could have been productive the whole summer, kids or no!

Here are most of the articles I wrote about Otakon 2025:

When’s The Best Time To Scream In Public? Catching Up With Ladybeard At Otakon 2025

There is nobody like Ladybeard, the most unique performer I have ever had the pleasure of meeting in two countries. Now that I’ve been covering his career for nine years, I framed this interview like a retrospective. And now that I’ve been weight training more, you know I had to ask him about his weekly splits.

Ryoko Shiraishi Goes Camping

Ryoko Shiraishi is best known as the voice actor for the titular Hayate the Combat Butler, but she also has some great campfire food and drink recs. For Otakon’s 2025 Camping theme, Shiraishi taught us all her take on the American s’more (a toasted marshmallow dipped in crunchy cereal) and wondered whether it’s still called a “hot dog” without the bun.

Apothecaries and Assassins: Q&A with Minoji Kurata

Otakon needed to do a better job vetting questions for Minoji Kurata, one of the two manga artists currently creating comics inspired by the Apothecary Diaries novels. I gasped when somebody asked about the other artist’s tax evasion scandal (Kurata declined to answer). Didn’t put any of that in this writeup but I thought you should know!

This Monster Wants to Eat Me Spins a Deadly Fairy Tale

Move over, Monster Boy Summer! Monster Girl Fall is here with this fantastic yuri horror. I adored the premiere and I’m happy there’s a show to fill The Summer Hikaru Died-shaped hole in my heart. I love when yuri is edgier than it is sweet, and this definitely fits the bill.

Welcome Back to the Bed and Breakfast for Spirits

Kakuriyo -Bed & Breakfast for Spirits- is a reminder to never give up hope that your favorite one-season anime could get a revival, even years later. This is the rare otome show to receive such a boon, which makes it special even though I think the content is fairly generic. Can we do Monthly Girls Nozaki-kun next, please?

I am pretty sure I completed at least one more write-up but it’s lost to either Anime News Network’s dodgy search function or my poor, long-suffering editors’ mile-long backlog. In its stead you can check out my pieces for the Fall Anime Preview Guide or my submission to our most recent editorial group column: Anime Dubs As Good As Cowboy Bebop. And I know this doesn’t hold much weight from somebody who writes a blog post every 5 months, but I just completed two longform features that I’m vibrating with excitement to share. Hopefully soon!