2025 Musings

Aaaaand here we are. I can’t believe we’re about to be over halfway through the 2020s. It really is true what they say about time moving faster the older you get. Anyway, 2025 was indeed a year. A very interesting. Year. A year of a lot of scrambling and uncertainty. As I write this now, I’m back into some semblance of normal, but who knows how long that will last. I felt like everything was shaken up, and I still have no idea where all the pieces will fall.

So let’s start this off with…

tariffs, restocks, and strikes, oh my

Haha oh wow. First, let’s just get this out of the way: fuck Donald Trump. Okay, cool, moving on–

It was a very rock and roll year for me and my partner with our business. It began with a rough 2024 holiday season because of Canada Post strikes…and then the problems just kept coming. Canada got slapped with tariffs, which we were safe from until the exception for small parcels was removed in August…right after we just wrapped up collecting the funds for the dinosaur card Kickstarter. We were very lucky we got in touch with White Squirrel, who were offering discounted services for exactly this situation, and they helped us out of that mess. I can’t express my relief enough for that.

I’d say the majority of our online sales go to Americans, but now with all the tariff garbage, those numbers have severely dropped–which of course, I don’t blame them for. We had to even close our shop to American orders for a period just so we could figure out how to implement these new fees. Basically: thanks for this annoying headache that has made our business worse. It’s great.

On top of all of that, this year was just the worst timing with our stock–all of our big ticket items just ran out. Our original card decks, our blankets, plenty of our popular items…which, you know, is good in theory, but because we were scrambling so much this year from low shop sales, an abysmal holiday season previous, and all the fun new extra fees everywhere, budgeting for the reprints of these items was way harder than usual. Somehow… we made it work. (And by somehow, I mean we did 15 fucking conventions…I am so tired lol).

The hardest part of all of this was feeling like the walls were closing in. I know I am in the arts, and this is a volatile job to have. I’ve always prided myself on putting my eggs in “many baskets”, so that if one didn’t work out, I could just focus on the baskets still standing. But this year felt like every single basket was tipping. Dominoes toppling over one by one. The new American policies, the Canada Post strikes, the AI boom–it’s making it feel like everything I’ve built over the last 10 years is gonna completely crumble. And frankly, I don’t know what else I’d do if I lost this.

So… yeeeeah. It’s been a rough year, in that regard. I’m keeping my chin up, working hard, and seeing what I can do between all of this, but this is candidly a lot of the thoughts and anxieties circling my brain.

On a Lighter Note–Comics!

Comics!! Last year I mentioned how disappointing it was that I didn’t get to work on my next published graphic novel. Well, good news–this year, it happened! FANGS AND ALL, my next book, is juuuust wrapping up now. I’ve been working very hard on it all year long, and it’s already crazy to me that it’s almost ready and soon to be out there. And by soon I mean… probably fall next year.

So what is FANGS AND ALL?! Well, you might recognize it as “The Curse of Blackwood Manor” which it was titled as on my site for a while. It had a name change this year, and honestly a lot of revamps, to get it to where it is now, and I’m very happy with it. It’s a story about love, family, and monsters. I’ll have plenty to talk more about it in the coming year, I’m sure!

Life Stuff

Well on top of all of…(gestures above) that, this year still had a lot of highs. And lows, of course, but so it goes. I revamped a lot of websites, including my own here, which I like so much more now. I wrote a whole blog post about that! I also kept a little photo travelogue with my GameBoy, which I also made a blog post about. I think I blogged more?? Which was nice. I need to spend more time on my own website, now that I’ve made it nice and perfect for me.

I generally talk a lot about mental health stuff on these posts. Last year I mentioned looking into more professional means for myself, and this unfortunately didn’t happen this year. But I do think I’ve made some progress. It’s a very hard thing to pick, or sometimes unpick, your own brain. One of the better changes I’ve implemented this year is…using social media less! Shocking, I know!! Turns out, though, I can’t trust myself not to go on it. So I’ve been using lots of blocking add-ons to help schedule my time on these sites, and that’s been helping a lot. Can’t recommend doing something like that enough, if you’re like me and find you can’t help it. I use Leechblock on Firefox if you want a decent one.

Anyway, before I delve into my good things of 2025, one of the better things I’m proud of is this marks YEAR 2 of going to the gym regularly, baby! Two whole freaking years!! I’m so proud of it and my progress, I’m sharing some photos of myself (hissss) just to prove it! These two are a few months apart, even! Wowza!

CONSISTENCY, BABY!!! (and maybe adding a little extra protein to the diet lol)

Anyhoo, here’s a list of other cool shit:

• I got a new tattoo! It’s a Dunkleosteus on my arm. I get a new tattoo almost every year but dammit, it’s worth saying!
• I also, finally, GOT MY EARS PIERCED. Which I have never done, because of gender things, but now that I’m more comfortable in my masc-y gender I suddenly felt more inclined to get them–however that makes sense.
• I got that new Merlin birding app! I didn’t do any birding, which I would have liked to try, but it was still fun being able to identify the bird calls outside. We had a lot of chimney swifts flying around this year!
• My partner and I went to lots of movies in theatres this year! I’ll try to list them all below.
• Our spot at the Montreal Artist Alley Shop was upgraded to a wall spot! And we also got a shelf at the new Toronto one. Bless the Artist Alley Shops also saving our asses this year.
• I mean…I already talked about it above, but it bears repeating that I finished an entire 245 page graphic novel this year.
• I also finished an 18+ comic, Lab Partners, which has been one of our best selling books on our table this year. Did you know…sex sells??? Who would have guessed.
• I’m usually in the “wears all black” camp, but this year I tried branching into more colours. I actually put more effort into my fashion choices this year. This is hard as a chronic Clothes Shopping Loather, but hey, I’m getting there.

Media of the Year

So…this year saw some major shifts. For one, Netflix booted us out. They finally caught on to our parent-mooching ways, and we had no way of jumping back in without paying the damn subscription. So were were without Netflix for most of the year, and it was honestly so nice. I was sad at first, mostly because I was finally able to keep up with Wrestling, but in the long run? I felt so much freer. It made me realize I would just play a lot of stuff just to have it on while working, and not really enjoy it. My partner and I have been collecting DVDs of our favourite watches, so it was great to turn to those and put on what we liked. I felt like I actually watched movies and TV shows this year, as opposed to just having them on. Basically: annoying to lose it at first, but I think it was for the best.

We also hopped off of Spotify this year. For…reasons.

Movies/Series:

• Schitt’s Creek: okaaaay both of our families kept saying it was good so we gave it a try and…yeah, it was good.
• Mickey 17: We watched this one in theaters. I’m not…sure? About it? But it wiggles in my brain pretty often? Enjoying Robert Pattinson’s era of playing guys with funny voices.
• Princess Mononoke (in IMAX): this was my birthday treat. Yes, I’ve seen this movie five billion times but the IMAX really made it even more breathtaking. If that’s even possible.
• Kpop Demon Hunters: what else can I say here other than we watched this one like seven times in a row after seeing it. The kids are alright with this one.
• The Amazing Digital Circus: we also finally gave this one a try and have rewatched the whole thing several times. Yeaaah it’s very good. (Can you tell we had some comfort media this year–?)
• The Bear: I thiiiink we watched this last year, too? But we did a rewatch this year with the new season. Pretty good show, but the new seasons are losing me a little.
• Sinners: saw this one in theaters and oogghhh. Incredible watch. Crazy that we saw it a month from its release, and the theatre was still packed.
• Shin Godzilla: also saw this in theatres, and funny enough!!! I had just been mentioning it to my partner I wanted to see it, but was having trouble finding it online. Lo and behold, it showed up at our local theater. Goooood shit.
• Frankenstein: also in theaters. Del Toro will always give us a visual feast, thank you for the meal.
• WWE Wrasslin‘: I mentioned above that, before Netflix booted us, that I was finally able to follow wrestling for a bit. It was fun to follow but I’m not missing it as much as I thought. I do miss seeing Rhea Ripley in action, though…
• Wake Up Dead Man: the most recent watch in theatres. The Knives Out movies have been fun watches, and it’s nice having a movie series of just little murder mysteries. I enjoyed this one much more than Glass Onion, though the first one still stands on top for me.

Video Games

• Pokemon Legends ZA: I’m currently still playing as I write this summary, since it was my treat after finishing the colours on my graphic novel. I was a big fan of Legends Arceus, so I was super looking forward to this one, and I really think it delivers! I’m vastly preferring the Legends Pokemon games to the mainline ones.
• Phogs: So like…remember that weird cartoon, CatDog? Well, what if they were both dogs. So like, DogDog. And you and player 2 controlled each head. And then you solve wacky puzzles together. We kinda just got this one on a whim because it was on sale and a 2-player coop game, and we had a lot of fun. A very cute, wacky game.
• Hades 2: I didn’t play this, but Winter did. They had such a good time with the first one, and we waited diligently for this one to come out of beta before even touching it. Stylish, fun new characters, and a very grand plot–but ultimately, I don’t think it does better than the first one.
• Mario Kart 8: I’ve had this game for a while but this year, Winter and I buckled down and played a lot of it. Sometimes you’re really just hit with the Mario Kart Itch ™ and it simply must be scratched.
• Alba: A Wildlife Adventure: I played this one earlier this year, because I really needed something calm and simple. It’s a game where you play as a little girl on an island, and your goal is to basically photograph and catalogue all the wildlife there. It aims for a younger age range but it’s still very endearing. At least I got to go birding in the virtual world.
• Date Everything: this was also played by Winter while I watched. It’s a wacky dating sim where you date all the objects in your home that get humanized forms. A lot of these were very hit or miss for me but it was entertaining? Winter made a big post about it on their blog.

Music

• Bones UK (both the self-titled album and Soft): had these guys on my radar for a bit when on Spotify, and ended up buying both of their albums. I prefer the self-titled album but both are greaaaat, I love how kinda weird they are.
• Sordid Pink (self-titled album): I bought the album based on one song, and turned out the rest of the album was sadly not as much like that song, but it really grew on me? Something about it tickles my brain right.
• Vanity Theft–Get What You Came For: these guys also have a really fun sound that wiggles in my brain…in the best way.

For as rocky as this year was…I’m feeling good about it, somehow. I’m feeling good about 2026. I already have some plans (vending at my first furry con, going to a concert, maybe even…marriage?!?!), and holding on to those tightly as I brave my way into the second half of this decade. Oh boy.

Happy new year!