We always had at least seven or eight people (often more than ten) for our Otakon meet-ups, but this year only five core regulars showed up including myself, which actually felt a bit more fun and personal.

Here's some stuff I did and photographed:

Thursday - this is the early day where all you can do at the convention center is pick up your registration, a two hour wait just to get inside. I met up with everyone and we ate at ESPN zone, kind of expensive and not a good selection but we goofed off in the upstairs arcade for a while. We were seated there under the following gigantic thing:



Shaq as Godzilla and some other guy as Gigan! I don't know sports, but I do know monsters. I run bogleech.com after all.

Friday - first actual con day. After my friend Cait and I scoured the whole dealer's room, I watched "Big Man Japan," a live action Japanese movie with some amazing monster designs, definitely worth seeing if you're as big into creatures as I am, though not especially funny and fairly slow paced.



Here's some of the cosplay I recognized and loved:



The Dee Dees from Batman Beyond! In the series, Harley Quinn's crazy granddaughters.



This is a boss monster from one of the Persona games. Never played them, but love the enemy designs and recognized this from youtube videos. Bringing your own stripper pole is classy as hell.



GLISCOR! One of my favorite pokemon + decent costume + totally sexy. She didn't have time to make the claws, but I really appreciate that she thought to hold her hands like pincers.



I don't remember this thingy's name. It's from a recent video game called Blazblue.



Characters from PSYCHONAUTS, one of the most entertaining video games ever put together. I should've asked for a closeup of the homemade turtle, it was absolutely spot-on.



Cait behind a weighted companion cube. Cate went as the Pokemon Shaymin!

Saturday - this is the "big" day for Otakon. There was an early morning Pokemon get-together and Cate went as Shaymin. I took several pics but just uploaded the best few:



That mewtwo was possibly the most professional costume there. The girl who made it was really cute and mentioned her costume design website, but I completely forgot it.



This is about a FOURTH of the Pokemon who showed up at once, which were only about a fifth of the Pokemon at the con in general. Someday, it is going to be pokecon. Just you watch.



JYNX!



Cait is on the right, being adorable and holding her homemade adorable Shaymin plush with the only other Shaymin we found.

The Psyduck guy is HILARIOUS to me, because it's easy to pretend the guy's head isn't there and it's just Psyduck's face warping backwards.




Have I said before that I have a crush on Silent Hill nurses? Yeah, all of them.



THE MONARCH and Dr. Girlfriend from the Venture Brothers! While she didn't look as much like Dr. Girlfriend as a few other fans, the lady apparently made both costumes herself and their amazing quality puts her well above the rest of the VB cosplayers. You couldn't ask for better outfits for an officially licensed production...the Monarch looks like he came to life right from the show!



GIYGAS.



Later Saturday night, Mike and Ben took over an abandoned table in the art room and did five cent napkin commissions. I joined them and honestly had some of the most fun I've ever had at Otakon just drawing goofy doodles for around five people before we left. One girl paid in a pudding cup and a guy gave us a "tip" in squished brownies. He made them himself and they were amazing.

We then all went to "iron editor," which is where they give people some predetermined footage and they have to make an anime music video in just a couple hours. They hold little quiz games while they work, and I got called up entirely because I drew a shyguy on nintendo DS pictochat. Somehow I guessed an obscure anime correctly and won a free DVD, despite my layman's knowledge of anime in general.

Sunday - this is the "winding down" day where the con is only open until the afternoon. It's always a little depressing, but it leaves the rest of the day to just hang out and have fun with ourselves, which is what we're doing right now. We went to a pop culture museum for only $5 per person, basically just a really amazing antique store where nothing was for sale. This made me laugh:



Note the name of this.

On the way to eat, I did take my very final cosplay photo, another totally hot version of a personal favorite Pokemon:



WHY are they making all my pokemons hot?! I'm never going to see Tentacruel the same way again! Not that its name alone didn't conjure enough images.

I bothered this poor girl in the middle of a phone conversation and held up everyone else so I could take a shot, but when would I EVER see someone dressed like a jellyfish monster again? There's no telling! I love how her hair basically serves as the tentacles.