… it! is! done! no…, how about she! haz! chosen! well, kinda. how about a COMPANY NAME (woot!) for an awesome new baking company that myLisa has finally released to the hungry general public called none other than:

 thank you ALL so much who took the time week’s back to enter their submissions for the NAMING contest.

so… while there wasn’t a CLEAR winner; as in any one person who’s idea was picked as the winning Baking Company name, there were 3 runner-ups that myLisa chose as folk’s who’s ideas pushed her in the right direction!! Here’s our winners:

• Nohm Nohm Bakery, (Angela Schaub) 
• Sinful Sweets, (Lauren Anderson)
• Bake My Day (Jody, Eli, ANne, Eva, and David – they can split it??)

So… i need you winners to get in touch with me soon to let me know what you want myLisa to make for you. Pie? cookies? a tart or two?

WEBSITE AND ALL KINDS OF GOODIES COMING SOON! So be ready for myLisa and Encore Bakery to someday take over the world! woot!

… hey all, mylisa and i haven’t completely fallen off the side of the earth… promise. we’ve been sooo busy since returning i can’t even begin to tell you all what’s been up… so i won’t. not yet.

for now, please know that we’re getting back in the swing of things. myLisa’s picked a name for her company, she’ll award prolly 2-3 “her favs & thanks for playing!” PIE awards to some of you, and we’ll release the new name, look and feel of the design within about a week or so…

until then, love to you all, and i’ll write again soon! PROMISE!

… well, half-baked at least. get it? that’s a baking joke. see what i did there? it’s like i’m a genius. hah! … hmmm… k. sorry. i’ll move on.

THANK YOU FOR ALL THE ENTRIES OVER THE PAST 2 WEEKS FOR LISA’S NEW BAKED GOODS COMPANY!

i wanted to letchoo all know that lisa is now in the midst of deciding what the name will be, and is very grateful for all the entries that have given her a lot of inspiration.

please note, that on the off chance she decides on a name that doesn’t match up in any way, or has a ‘closeness’ to a few of the entries, that i’ll convince her to consider picking the top 3-5 folks and send out some ‘attaboy’ pies for their efforts! k?

hope you all are well.. things are crazy crazy around here, since there’s also a certain wedding right around the corner next month we’re eager to see happen! ours!? yesh!? woot!

… the contest! yesh, all you cool peoplz, help us out!

myLisa has decided she wants to kick some pastry booty and dive into the scary and daunting underworld of baking goodness professionally! she’s a helluva baking-fool when it comes to pies, cakes, cupcakes, cookies, candies, breads, and even sugar free diabetes-friendly deserts! lots of options for her future clientelé to choose from!

what better way to grow a business while growing-fattening up everyone around you, eh? she’s very excited about this opportunity, and is beginning to develop a local following (cookie-cult?) that is likely to soon help network for her as well.  what she needs from all of you, though, is even better! because it’s a contest where you might just win bragging rights, AND a specially delivered pile of NOM NOMMY baked goods as a thank you!

NAME LISA’S BAKED GOODS COMPANY! For the next 2 weeks, we’ll be running a contest and asking all of you to help name myLisa’s new company! the rules are simple:  leave a comment with an idea for her company’s name! (duh) please keep it PG, this is a real company we’re planning on developing here! All ideas are game, and she’ll entertain any concepts such as acronyms, abbreviations, fun and witty word twists, etc! the only real caveat being that you need to be nice and understand that there may not be a winner at the end of this contest, it’s HER choice!! if the dust clears and no one stands out and is deemed “the one,” please be okay with that. (if that were to happen, maybe we’ll have some honorable mentions!!! enter as many comments during the 2 weeks as you need to. who knows where inspiration hits, eh? just please respect other companies that already exist. don’t plagiarize names already in existance, okay?

if a winner is chosen, no matter where you live in the US, we’ll contact you and get your important info in order to send you your prize! baked goods! NOM NOM NOM!

now, go out and tell all of your friends to enter this too! who knows, if they win, you may get to share in their treats… if they are willing!

let the NAME GAME BEGIN!

… sorry about pulling the recent post, folks. there were some issues with the pics, so i figured i’d just post this one to letchoo’ all know how damned happeh we are. it’s really gross, actually. we’ve been told we’re actually hard to be around right now. i knoez… i knoez… but really we jes’ want the wedding and all the silliness to be over so we can launch ourselves headfirst into whatever our future holdz. 

… while we had a TON of things to do this weekend, lisa and i opted to relax. something we’ve not been able to do for many weeks. who’da thunk that planning a wedding, living…., er, existing could be such hard work, eh? almost 2 weeks ago now, we had our ‘engagement photos’ as well, so i do hope to be able to showcase those soon too.

so i don’t ramble, this is an important holiday to remember…. so while you all do that, also peek at the flowers that lisa and i planted today, allll in the spirit of remembrance and of course, PRETTY FLOWERS! dur. hope you all are well!!!

… i’ll leave it to the titles in the photo gallery, but it’s been a fun, crazy and hectic past few months. between our engagement, a new kitteh, friendz, family, work, a new business and much much more… i just wanted to share a brief and hopefully cute gallery montage of some fun events in our lives.

love to you all, and especially those of you who occasionally still frequent this blog to see if i’ve gotten off my busy (nawt lazy!) ass and finally posted something!

click individual pix, or choose view as slideshow!

[Show as slideshow]

… a few of you have asked me over the past few weeks where i do my design work, where i create, where i have fun with all those zany things running around in my head. well, tonight i thought i’d show you all my new & improved home office where ‘da magic happenz baby! woot woot! lisa and i found a killer deal at Storables for an additional desk for me, and it now keeps all my printing stuff in line and in order. i cannot create in a messy space, which was a problem for me for years because, well, i can be a real piggy at times. i’ll come home, set stuff down on my workspace, rinse and repeat that behaviour and well, you know the rest of that story.

i now have specific places to leave things temporarily, to file things, to even stack things when needed. my professional space is 110% dedicated to one side for design & whatnot, while the other side has a table for painting, cartooning (if i’m freehandin’ it, yo!) and whatever else i deem necessary. posted at the pics of my new ‘design’ space, and yesh… someday i will be running 2 monitors, not one… oh… the dreams… the power!enjoy!

…okay, not the real ones, but who reads an actual newspaper nowadays anyway, eh?  i just haftoo take a moment today and announce that i’m so proud of my darlin’ fiance, lisa, everyone!

she’s produced her first webcomic!!

woot woot! http://thedayjob.wordpress.com

go there, link it, support her creative efforts! oh, oh, oh, and for the record, anyone viewing her site (or any other site out there) in Internet Explorer 6 or below should jes’ turn the screen off and go back to bed… everyone else? you should be able to see it jes’ fine, or click on the image for full viewing-goodness!

… i know, i know. i’m sorry everyone. i feel i need to take a few moments to describe what’s been going on in my life. sooo… here goes:

i’ve been working 40+ hours a week at my day job. i’ve been working what feels about the same amount at my graphic design business. i’ve been working with my fiance to plan our wedding. i’ve been a good friend to those i call/consider friends and staying as social as i can. i’ve been paying bills. i’ve been saving money for bills. i’ve been saving money and planning on how to cover our wedding plans. i’ve been losing weight. (16-18lbs so far, depending on the day!) i’ve been trying to organize my home office. i’ve joined a networking group. i’ve joined 2 of those, in fact…, one new one online and one face-to-face group. i’ve been avoiding yard work. i’ve been really really avoiding a lot of small things we need to do around the house. i’ve been avoiding writing this post because there’s sooo much to write, and i’m not sure it’s even worth it.

here’s the end result. i miss you all. i’ve not had any time to peruse many of your sites during breaks and whatnot during the workday, and @ home in the evenings i either collapse in a heap or work on design projects and don’t surf at all. sooooo… a huge gynormous collective “i sorries” and i hope you all will forgive me. for those of you who have stayed true and voted weekly on fuzziechadsrule,  i truly do appreciate that as well, and would like to thank you for having some fun with me each week on that silly site.

what i DO have to do tho, is cover 2 quick movie reviews tho…. k? this is important stuff, so focus wif’ me:

WIN! my fiance lisa, breanne & roger, doug & lani, jayson, danH and i all went to see ‘watchmen‘ in the big ‘ol IMAX theatre last weekend. the result? PURE AWESOME.  i’m not going to rant and rave about it though, you have to do that yourselves if you’re smart enough to see it in the theatre, and NOT at home for the first time.  Here’s the deal though; read the graphic novel first. find a friend, buy it for 14 bucks, whatever…. but seriously take the time to read the words of the story first so you know what to expect. WHY, you ask? Because the movie purposely takes you through FRAME BY FRAME and intentionally through every tidbit of the book. it’s not an action film. it’s not a huge pile of explosions, voilence and the same old crap we’re used to seeing for 2 hours or so. it’s art. it’s an impressive view of ‘what if’ told by a reclusive, ‘fugitive’ masked hero that tells of a time before 1985 where superheros were REAL. they saved people. they did what the average joe couldn’t. they mattered… now it’s 1985 (again, stay with me.. alternate timeline) ”masks” have been voted illegal, nixon is on his 3rd term, we won vietnam, the cold war is still very real and the world is on the verge of nuclear war… what’s worse, now someone is killing the retired superheroes, and they are possibly the worlds only chance for survival. sooooo.. yah, holy crap. it’s good. but watch it knowing what you’re getting into, and you’ll enjoy it much more!

FAIL! while this next movie wasn’t a theatre experience, i’m not sure i’ve ever been so happy to wait ‘for the rental… Twilight was supposed to be the biggest movie ‘evah if you were or are a fan of Stephanie Meyer’s series of  novels about teen’aged’ vampires, they’re loves, adventures and more. my ONLY caveat regarding this review will be that i have not read and come to appreciate the books yet.  i can say appreciate with little to no reservation, for i witnessed both Lisa and Breanne completely withdrawal themselves from society for 4-5 days as they ravaged and devoured all 4 (?) books prior to watching this video release. it was funnier than hell and they both read over 1700 pages each in a short short short time!

here’s their reactions to the film. 

and here’s their reaction to the news that their may be a NEW director 4 the next film…

that’s all i got for now folks. hope you’re all well.. hope to hear from some of you who prolly think i’ve abandoned ya’all… i haven’t! i promise! i’ll be back soon!

… one of my truly best friends, lani, who you all know (previously referenced as L) has recently become part of a group many of you may be familiar with: the “unemployed.” lani is one of those people who didn’t want to take it sitting down though, and has chosen to chronicle her efforts to find a new job, a new career and a creative path that i think we can all relate to in one sense or another.

she’s done so by illustrating the past +-30 days since her last day on the job with a new website, a hilarious cartoon, and a keen sense of humor that, if you know lani as i do, sends one wiggling in fits of giggles and hysteria.  please take a moment and visit PR Issues, Life of a Pack Rat. don’t forget to use the top right arrow and view the other entries too! they are hilarious! (then come back, i’m not done writing yet)

lani’s new endeavor also has the included side benefit of hopefully becoming something much larger with all of YOUR help. she’s constantly working on the site; not only to post new chronicles each day, but also to turn it into a possible revenue stream through advertising and such.  She’s a pretty smart girl, pretty darned talented, and i think she may actually secretly be a unicorn. (tho don’t tell her husband, who seems to have an otherwise unrelated reaction of  fear and loathing reaction toward mythical one-horned beasts)

please join me on a daily or at least moderately regular basis and support my dear friend Lani as she continues her journey. leave her comments on her site. link to hers. advertise with her. give her spare change. who knows, maybe with the kindness of all of you, she won’t have to go find a day job, because she’ll be doing something she loves like this!

thanks all!

… hello to you all, my cherished friends. (and to new viewers, hai!) i wanted to take a moment and toot my horn a smidge and ask you all to visit a new website of mine. it’s a site i’ve not needed for over 15 years of creativity, fun and exploration (i knoez, that sounded like a fraggle rock episode) but the time was right, so here goes!

please consider yourselves welcome @ www.trendesignsnw.com

this is pretty exciting stuff for me. it’s a chance to continue on a grander scale what i’ve done for what seems like a lifetime, and never gotten tired of doing! as beforementioned, i’ve never needed a website before, since all my business has been word-of-mouth referrals… but like i said, it’s time to grow up a little more, gain some web presence, and of course execute my plans to take over the world!

important note:  this also opens up my doors to business anywhere in the world. the joy of email, FTP sites, phones and the internet allow me to work comfortably most anywhere to serve the needs of my clients. i will also reciprocate direct referrals with gift certificate incentives! (referral does need to end with a completed business transaction)  

if you have a new or existing business with marketing and graphic design needs, which are detailed on my website and cover many levels, please consider my services and skills! ~ thank you!   

… hi all. sorry i’ve been missing… i’ve been on a vacation of sorts for the past week and a half. please excuse the sudden disappearance from ALL of my blogs and from society in general. myLisa’s parents have been with us during this time as well, so it’s been fun being tourist’y with them, as well as simply sitting on our booties and enjoying quality time. we’ve taken them to the space needle, pike place market, houseboats around lake union, gaswork’s park, and even had lunch with my family in olympia recently! (parents, sisters, bro-in-law and their kids) and yesh, pics soon to follow! so here i am, back to work at the office and how do i look today?, a little like this:

lazer eyes! pew pew pew!

so, i’m back at work, getting re-aquainted with all the work i’ve fallen behind on, and jes’ wanted to touch basis with you all… say hello, and also state that i’m plenty glad to be an American today given that our new President was sworn in safely today. let the good times commence, eh?

hugs to you all.

… where everyone should stop, take a moment and admire their work. i don’t just mean at your job, but at home, survey everything around you. remember what’s important to you. your friends, your family, your loved ones… TELL them how you feel. share with them the impact they’ve had on your life. let them know that even tho it’s easy to take things for granted, that their contributions to your life and others doesn’t go unnoticed. tell them thank you.

so, to everyone and anyone who knows me in ANY fashion: imagine i am standing in front of you and jes’ told you those words… happy holidays

now, i can’t let this entry go on anymore with suuuuch seriousness! my dearest friend L, posted these pics of how she’s been handling the snow in her neighborhood. (i adore her and her hubbers to pieces, so i had to share. OMGCANYOUSAYFISHERMAN&DUCKEEZ!?) i swear to you all that L is magical… take care all.

… in our hearts and minds, she did. hello all… it’s with sadness in my leetle heart that i share the following news:

Majel Barret joined his husband Gene Roddenberry yesterday.  do you recognize her picture!? if not, you have heard her voice many times: she was the voice of the Enterprise’s computer for every single show and big screen adaptation of the series. She passed away yesterday, sadly  age 76.

“The First Lady of Star Trek,” as she was known, married the famous creator of star trek in japan in august 1969. she also worked in other television shows like bonanza, the untouchables, and the lucy show. Her last work was two weeks ago, reprising her role as the voice of the mighty Federation ship for the new Star Trek movie by J.J. Abrams. i think this is totally cool that she got to do this one last homage of sorts for the upcoming star trek reboot. for those of you who don’t know, it’s coming out next year, and will focus on a young kirk and his budding crew as they face off with some nasties. i’ll save you the spoilers, but it really does look like it’ll be a hoot. (apple.com/trailers has a preview of it!)

most of you who know ME, know that i’m a huge star wars fan… but that doesn’t mean i won’t give a proper nod to a series and one of it’s best characters the proper respect once they warp into ‘whatever’s next’ once our time on this big blue planet is over. science fiction and fantasy was a huge part of my life as a kiddo, and frankly still is. it’s fun, it’s fantastic and it’s full of dreams and adventures. some of you experienced star trek during  it’s original run. i was born in ‘72, so while i prolly saw some of them at that point, i was too busy crapping myself to get the full appreciation. i STILL see them to this day and think, WOW.. visionaries made this stuff! i remember her most fondly in her role as the overbearing and telepathic mother of deanna troy in the star trek, next generation series where she often made EVERY MAN uncomfortable by blurting out sexual innuendos that she claimed all men (included capt picard and the klingon, warf) were “thinking about her.” it was a riot!

so… dearest Majel, rest in peace… and may your next adventure be as exciting as your last.

… WE CAN!! AWWW YEAH BOYEEE! two of our bestest friends, D&L sent me this awe-inspiring video the other day. ”L” took our heads off (not as gross as it sounds) and planted them on the figures in the video. funnier… then.. hell… and all kindsa-full of Holiday Cheer! if it’s slow to LOAD, that’s the internet’s fault, not mine. TRUST ME, WAIT FOR IT… it’s worth it jes’ for my expression alone. Lisa’s got the glasses on.. you all know me… and the others are D & L… PRICELESS!

… but i laughed so hard, i had coffee shoot outta my nose. i actually believe that youtube is made from parts of the devil, since it can suck away half a day before you know it. it was SENT to me tho.. i swear… and i’ve officially told this person that she’s evil and needs to not do this to me at the office. tee hee. have an awesome weekend, everyone!

… gawd i love that devilish smile. my leetle monkey seems to have found herself a new hat! (can’t take credit for the pic, her best friend Breanne took the shot) omg this is possibly my favorite pic of her evah. TOTALLY encapsulates her personality.

… hello to all of our friends, family, casual passerby’s, background lurkers and anyone else who may be reading this blog. i am very happeh’ and pleased to announce the engagement of Brian & Lisa. I’ve spent the last couple of weeks deciding on what to do about this, not knowing what has been stopping me from just doing it, doubting my own happiness and basically doing stoopid mindgames and all, when i finally realized that i’m an idiot. i’ve found love again. i am happeh. i feel good. Lisa makes me feel good. i want a life with her that’s better than even what we already have.

so… i did it… and here’s how:

most of you who know me, also know that i’ve been around this block before. yup, i’m one of the 68% of Americans that have been divorced. my ex and i are actually friends again. she’s still a wonderful woman and i’m happy that we’re able to remain friends. soooo, with that being said, you’d think i’d be able to pull from my memories of how things work and get all of this to go smoothly? right? WRONG.

when you buy a ring, it doesn’t magically come SET with the diamond. while i had picked the diamond already, i had put 20% down the previous week and whistled off into the wilderness simply thinking I’d come back the following week, pick it up and VOILA! yeah… NO. I paid it off on Monday and was promptly told that it would be ready within 6-8 business days. the lady actually HEARD my heart “fwunk” on the floor… i told her that this wasn’t going to be possible, since i was planning on proposing to Lisa this Saturday. She agreed with me immediately that this wasn’t possible, and that i should plan on changing that date.

after some negotiating, open weeping and i think a bribe or two, i was instructed to come back to the store on Friday night by 5:30 for the completed ring. no biggie.. right? well, NO. Lisa had friday off from her work, and i had no way to get her out of the house so i could sneak over to the jeweler and get the ring. i had to get her best friend to call and beg her to come over and help her with some fabric/sewing pattern issues to secure my “window of opportunity” to get the ring. just prior to Lisa leaving and my sneaking, the migraine hit. oh.. gawd… shoot… me now.

got the ring, drama was over! Lisa wasn’t aware of any plotting or deviousness on my part. Sunday we traveled to the Deception Pass State Park in the Port Orchard area. (or Mt Vernon, or Whidbey Island, or Anacortes, depending on which damned map you look at) There’s a sprawling bridge that spans the land masses that’s quite the site to see. I had planned on asking her ON the bridge. did that work? NO. while the weather behaved and gave us sun and scattered clouds, it’s also winter and we were hit with incredible winds that were bitter cold. (i imagined the ring being sucked out of my hand and flying over the bridge into the water, 300+ feet down) so, under the guise of a photoshoot for us, we happily snapped photos everywhere and walked across the bridge. on the other side, as she focused through her lens at yet another pic, i knelt to one knee and kinda “pulled on her sleeve.”

she looked down at me,  not seeing the tiny box and asked, “oh sweetie.. too cold? are you huddling?”

god i love her. once she realized what was happening, BRING ON THE TEARS! We both did, it was wonderful, the wind forever burned the tears into our faces and created too shiny red faces you see below. and her answer?, you wonder?

YES.

So, excuse the length of this entry. now please enjoy some video of our day. 3 parts, (one with my idiot self covering the mic and half the lens for a quarter of it, tho still cute…) and then a picture of my bride to be. OMGYEAH!!!!!

… some routines are not a bad thing at all. one of L’s and my favorite things is watching our new kitteh, kazi, play with our 2 year old boxer, ruckus. they absolutely adore each other, and while i feel the need to apologize for the shotty camera handling, (poor lighting, cloverfield-like tracking) the result is an absolute whooping of the dog.  but wait, i’ve said too much. watch and laugh and adore as we do.

yeah… life is good. it’s like our own wrestling pay-per-view… only fuzzier.  ;)