Hello, dear reader, and welcome to my blog – Weekend Otaku. Those of you that possess sufficient knowledge of English idioms and commonly anglicized Japanese words might understand its meaning right away. You might have to be an anime fan to understand my tagline or the image of furious pen writing above. Either way, a short explanation should make it clear to anyone who might need a little help.
An otaku is often considered to be a young person with an obsession toward “nerdy” pursuits, most often associated with some aspect of pop culture, whose enthusiasm toward such tends to have a detrimental affect on their social skills. The word (formerly) carries negative connotation, painting the image of a nerd kid with nerd glasses who can name all the Pokemon but is painfully awkward around normal human beings.
Prefixing the word ‘weekend’ is meant to imply that I lead a perfectly respectable and not obsessed life during the week and let my inner otaku run amok on the days that necessary life tasks like a job can’t interfere, much the same way a ‘Weekend Warrior’ hits the gym hard in his free time.
Of course the word, like most things in life, doesn’t work out perfectly. I do indeed have a predilection for most nerdy things, and anime in particular. I do like to spend my weekends enjoying my hobbies rather than doing anything that might be more productive but almost certainly less fun. I’m not a social butterfly by any means and I’m terrible with meeting new people. I speak little, and write even less. Still, I consider myself a pretty average person in most regards. The ‘young’ aspect of the Otaku half of my title applies a little less each day, and most people would tell me I’m far too old to be watching some Japanese cartoons. I am not an extreme fan of anything, let alone anime, and can rate my obsession over it as casual at best. I have a fair number of friends and I can manage most public situations with poise.
So I’m not really an otaku in the dictionary sense. It’s still a fun name though, isn’t it?
Even with the nerdish quality of the title, I will bear it proudly on this blog. I did say earlier that ‘otaku’ only formerly carried a commonly negative meaning, and even then mostly just in Japan. As of the year of this writing, it hasn’t been socially taboo to be a nerd for quite some time. Pop culture is at what seems to be an all-time high but I honestly won’t be surprised if it becomes even more mainstream. Otakus all over the world are becoming far more social than I probably will ever be thanks to the growing popularity and accessibility of quality anime. Pretty soon we’ll all be able to easily name all the Pokemon considering how trendy a certain smartphone app has become in such a short time, and I meet people all the time who are just as obsessive (well, probably moreso) about their hobbies as I am about mine.
My inspiration for starting a blog thus came out of a desire to share my casual enthusiasm with more people and perhaps spark a few conversations along the way. I’ll write about anime shows, movies, manga, and news that I find interesting. As I said, I don’t do a lot of writing, but I do hope that you’ll enjoy reading what I do decide to share as I regale you with my thoughts and experiences as a (sort of) weekend otaku.
Weekend Otaku 
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