I just want to get a moment of your time before the weekend starts. It’s been more than a minute since we’ve heard from our buddy, Carl. As it turns out, he’s been busy launching a brand new site. Based around his illustration work and stand-up dogma, he’s created Creative By Birth.

Even thought it’s still in the early stages, we’re still excited to see Carl doing his thing like no other can do. We’re looking forward to watching CBB grow. Now get on over there, make your eyeballs happy, update your bookmarks and friend him if you’ve got a Tumblog. Keep your eye on this guy. He’s going to be so big, he’ll need to iron his shirt in a parking lot. (Don’t read too much into that Carl, it’s a total compliment.)

We wish you all the luck in the world in your adventure to make the world a more awesome place!

Growing up, my brother and I loved Lego. I loved the space collections, while he was a bit more down to Earth with the town collections. We were probably borderline basket cases at some points. But as I grew up, my collection began to slim down to favorites. Another stage of thinning occurred when Kim and I moved in together. I still have more Lego creations than I probably should, but Kim knew what she was getting into.

Now that we’re moving to New York, I’m condensing again and it’s getting really, really hard. This is especially true when I’m dealing with my original creations. Mind you, these were not just mere musings. These creations had stories and personalities to them. They were characters developed and realized.

In an effort to make the distillation process less painful, I’ve decided to chronicle my Lego creations via photographs. In addition to the “Derek originals,” I’ve decided to include my favorite “boxed” models. Per our usual treatment of pictures, there’s a Flickr set for you to comb through. But keep in mind, most of this stuff I made over 15 years ago. The pieces are slightly outdated and dusty (consider it space dust ). Enjoy.

And we’re not talking about a senior citizens, gentleman’s club either. We’ve done some silly things at our day job, but this has to be one of my favorite.

About two years ago, the then account brought in some store-prepared cupcakes. You know, the small kind wrapped under plastic with the swirl of pastel frosting on top. Well, we had one and commented on how they were edible, but extremely unpalatable. With one left over, our friend Matt placed it on shelf. He wanted to see how long it would stay there and how it would change and what spores were in the office air.

Time went on, and the cupcake got pushed to the back of the shelf and forgotten. Matt became a victim of downsizing, and now Kim and I are preparing to leave. We were cleaning off the shelves the other day and found the long lost cupcake.

As you might notice above, it looks like an ordinary cupcake. After (at least) two years of sitting on a shelf, the cupcake has not changed in appearance. I’ll give you a moment to let that sink in. When we rediscovered this, my first thought was, “What is this thing made of?” My second was, “Oh man, I ate one of those!”

For a while now, Kim and I have been making healthy changes in our eating habits. We never ate a lot of already-prepared and prepackaged foods to begin with, but now we find ourselves filling our basket with fresh produce and dairy. Sodas and other carbonated beverages have become special occasion items. This dusty cupcake only reassured us in our decision to change what went into our bodies. We hope everyone will take a cue from this cupcake and think twice about what they decide to eat.

With our self-imposed deadline to move looming closer and closer, our design work has been pushed to the back burner. But, the weather’s supposed to be great this week-end, and we’re going to enjoy it. Kim will be packing her new toy and should have something to offer next week from that. Until then, have an awesome week-end.

If there ever were a reason for us never to get into web work professionally, now we have one. Sometime in the past few days, our site came under the attack of a virus/Trojan horse. Somehow, a pretty little package came waltzing through our security and waited for us to sleep.

After an initial freak out and a sleepless night, we believe we’ve cleansed the infected areas. That’s one reason things have been slightly slow. It’s mainly been a lot of housekeeping  and a “real” post will come next week to catch everyone up to speed. Until then, have a great week-end everyone.

Image: Detail of The Procession of the Trojan Horse in Troy by Domenico Tiepolo (1773)