St. Patricks Day 2008!

Happy St. Patricks Day, everyone!

Another year at the Abbey Pub, and I gotta admit - it just doesn;'t disappoint. Ever. Let's recap, shall we?

(The pictures uploaded in reverse order, so we're looking from drunkest back to buzzing. fyi)


I stole her tiara, feather boa, a green sash, and a few hugs. Rowwr.




I asked her if I could snag a picture with her, and when she asked why, I basically told her, "Because your hair is wicked cool." Done.

Our dreadlocked hottie waitress. Very very virtuous. Very very patient. Digs guys in tiaras.



This is a girl that was there last year.. and I had a few "random shots with strangers" that had her in them last year too. I remembered her because she looks like she's in 8th grade. She's 23. I asked. Although I think that she may just have a sweet fake i.d.


Will, Ed, Jessie, and myself

Yours truly, with my friendly phillipino brutha Harold. He's usually very friendly, but he was angry about me stealing his signature pose.



The Chicago fire department beat the police department that morning (played the game at the United Center, where the Hawks and Bulls play!) and these guys had their trophy with them. I, being the smooth talker that I am, conned them into leaving me alone with the thing for a minute. I believe they hosed it down immediately upon return.



Design Girl, me (stole someone's sunglasses for a while and decided to channel Corey Hart), DG's fiancée Lee, co-worker Missy, and Missy's hubby Brian.

Woot St Patricks!

Happy day, everyone!

Invisible Rope

Happy New Year!

A new year, a new printer...

Working on developing my freelance work up here, and it's coming along, albeit slowly. I have the worst time trying to figure out how to position myself as both a serious graphic designer and a cartoonist. Typically, clients see me as one or the other.. so I decided to take a leap of faith here and go with a name that embraced the goofier side of my personality and my work:




Just a rough sample of the layout I'm going for... but yeah, you're reading that correctly. The Cuckoo Studio. Whether or not the quotes remain by the time I take it live has yet to be seen...

A big thanks in advance goes screaming across the web to my pal Shoo, for all of the programming it's going to take.

Happy new year, you crazy kids.

Red and Green Thumb

Bah!!!

This poinsettia was dead the second I laid eyes on it at the store. Sorry, Holiday Cheer - I seem to have killed your plant.

Shoo just screwed up

Oh man. Another buddy went and got hitched. Shoo, what were you THINKING?

Crap. Ok, ok, cue the music.
~Another One Bites the Dust~

Here's the lowdown:
Shoo just married his girl of two years, Sarah, and all of the events took place in Springfield this past weekend - namely, one Springfield Motorboat Club. It was fun seeing the guys and gals again, and I'll go out on a limb here and say that we had a good time getting together again. As one of your older friends, Shoo, take my word on this: The older we become, the harder it is to get the old gang back together again. It never gets any easier than it is now. That said, it was great to finally meet some of the good friends of Shoo's and Sara's for the first time. Dave Heinzel, that includes you, bud. I told you before, and I'll repeat it here:

You really photogged the shit of this wedding. Without the auto-focus setting clicked on.

I took a ton of snapshots, and Shoo was kind enough to upload these to his own Flickr account. Hopefully you get a kick seeing these.

Here are a few of my faves:


I don't do production work.


I will, however, pose with my buddy on the eve of his big mistake. ;)

After the rehearsal dinner, we left and got dressed down (some more than others), and headed to the watering hole of choice.


Me, posing with buddy Kyle(still)Kyle, aka Captain Lou Albano's bastard child.


See what I did here? I yelled, "Hey Mohawk!" when this wild stranger was walking by, and told him I needed a photo with him. He obliged, and once again, I miraculously emerge from a cool photo op, totally unscathed. (I believe in jinxes, guardian angels, and karma). And I swear - He posed like that with NO prompting.


This is why I'm always turning down the shots my friends buy for me. I suck with the hard stuff (yes, I know my shot has a little pink umbrelle in it. stop hating).


The bride and groom, ladies and gentlemen.

Maybe more pix in the near future. Stay tuned, readers.

Apple Care with the Hoff

Yesterday afternoon I was walking towards the bathroom when I saw the Hoff, my office's mac tech support guy, walking ahead of me. I whistled and he stopped, we shook hands, and I asked him about a problem I'm having with my laptop at home. Well, we continued walking, and as luck would have it, we both were going to the bathroom. I was the first to enter, and I walked into a stall (stage fright prohibits me from hitting up the close quartered urinals frequently). Hoff walked into the second stall. This entire time we were still talking about my mac issue. He stops midway between "apple care" and "support should take care of that" to let loose the fury.

I'm so shocked, I had no reply.

Rushing out of my stall, washing my hands quickly as to avoid the oncoming rush of fecal particles, I said to him, "J, I didn't see you carrying a trumpet with you when we walked in here".

His reply: "Oh, I carry that everywhere I go", laughing.

No shame. :D

And yes, I will swear up and down on a stack of bibles that this is true.

You'll be watching this one twice.