I had to re-do an axle seal on one side yesterday and I put on new brakes, bled them, etc the whole process. Took it for a test drive and everything was fine. Then this morning I notice as I leave the house the E brake light is on the dash, yet the lever's not pulled. I make it down the road for a bit thinking it's just the sensor but something "felt" wrong even though it wasn't very strong of a resistance. I tried cranking on it and pumping it on and off, but it stayed on. Had to go home and switch cars for work. What happened?

Everything was installed correctly per FSM in the order specified. I've also done the brakes 2-3 times before including my wife's car and my previous car so brakes are familiar.

Check your brake fluid reservoir for low fluid.

I'll have to check when i get home, but I had it at Max when I was done. Tight lid, the whole thing.
I use a vacuum bleeder so I always have fresh fluid pouring in as I bleed.

One thing I've always struggled with was a good bleeding flow in the rear driver wheel. For whatever reason I never get more than a trickle out of that one vs the strong flow from the others. I'll sit there bleeding it for 5 minutes and no improvement. But that's happened before so this can't be that issue. And I do the FSM order of rear passenger, rear driver, front passenger, front driver.

If the fluid is up to the full mark then parking brake need adjustment. If you followed the fsm then you already did the bell crank adjustment after replacing the rear brakes. Rear brake pads have to be real close to the drum. I adjust them so there is slight rub when I am done. Also sometimes worn brushes in the alternator will trigger the brake light. If you pull the lever and the brake light gets brighter then that points to the alternator but I doubt that since your issue started after you did the rear axle and brakes.

Good point, I didn't change the adjustments since the brakes were not that old at all. I had a tight fit of the drum sliding on the shoes however so it didn't even cross my mind to do an official adjustment. I did a few of the old school "hard reverse stops" just out of habit whenever I do shoes. I didn't notice it brightening, but also wasn't looking for that this morning.

good news is i found the problem.

bad news, the brake line fitting was cross threaded into the brake housing backplate. So it was slowly seeping overnight, hence the brake light (good call on the fluid reservoir). It was practically empty when I looked in there. So now i have to figure out how to get this brake line re-fitted. wonderful. I knew it was tough getting back in the hole but those fittings are always a PITA to get back in.

DAMMIT!

oh man it took almost 3 weeks to get a brake line sent to me from a florida dealer. My local washington ones couldn't order it they said, too old of a part. That thing was a PITA to put back in esp on the side of the rear diff housing.

Don't strip your brake line fittings people!! It's only a $16 part but it's hard to come by

I'm happy that your new brake line solved your seepage issue with your rear brakes.
Had a seemingly similar problem for months with the ebrake light flickering on.

Like yours, the ebrake flickering was likely due to low brake fluid (which was at the min mark so it wasn't super low). I topped it off two days ago and the flickering seems to have stopped.

That must be the case because people told that to me also, but I don't see HOW the alternator is even close to being involved with the brakes. Toyota wouldn't mix those completely different systems on purpose - would they?

How could they be intertwined?