seankempf.com » my life

I’ve been rather sluggish as of late in wanting to post, code or write anything. But I feel that’s about to change. I have new inspiration and it has lit my mind up with that spark that I’ve been missing. So my latest project is a rewrite of an old desktop application called eSheep. eSheep serves no real purpose other then to be a cute little diversion from your daily computer routine. He/she sits on your desktop doing random sheep things and just generally distracting you with it’s cuteness. Why rewrite something like this? Well, there are actually a few reasons. One, Kelli loves sheep . Two, the original app is a 16bit application and as such, will not run on my 64bit version of Windows 7 which is what I run on all my systems. Also, it’s just a good challenge and the graphics are easily obtained from the net which leaves me only to code the behavior and display routines. So, off I go on my mission to bring eSheep to my current desktop. I’ll be posting my progress as I go along and hopefully will have something done in a week or two.

eSheep –

What a year. 2011 is winding down and I can’t say I’m sad to see it go. Things will finally be leveling out in my life which will be the greatest Christmas present I could ever wish for. In case you just got here by chance and don’t actually know what I’m talking about (which is unlikely since there are about 3 people that look at this blog and they are close friends/family) let me recap. I got divorced. Sold my home. Bought another house. All in the span of about 4 months. Now, I’ll explain what that actually means. Divorce = Complete change of everything in my life. Sold my home = Handed over the first “home” I’ve ever had to another person who now begins the process of making it HIS home. Bought another house = Pull everything out of my first home and shuttle it to my new (new as in different, since the house was built in the 1930′s, it’s not new house. I use the terms “home” and “house” this way because I believe a house can not be a home until it has been lived in for awhile by a person and experiences/memories have been developed in it. Now don’t get me wrong. I really like my new house. It has weird angled doors and steps that shouldn’t be where they are. It’s considered 1.5 stories because the second floor has slanted walls instead of full opened rooms. There’s one room upstairs that I have absolutely no clue what it is there for. It’s like a bunch of walls HAD to come together, so they just hung a door there and called it a room. All of these quirks seem like the architectural representations of me. I’m not standard. I have odd and strange rooms in my brain that I never knew why they were there before. But after everything I’ve went through this past year, I’m beginning to realize that it’s okay to open these rooms up and let their contents spill out as I start a new life. It’s time to explore all of the hidden places and gather up whatever I find waiting there. Then I can put it all to good use and make 2012 MY year.

Rough night. Migraine headache pushed me to a point that I hadn’t been to in a long time. Even have the gin blossoms today to prove it. But again, I made it through and was awakened to my cell phone and some great news. Laura (my realtor) told me that the inspection updates that I requested be made to my (soon to be) house were excepted with no problems. AND, the seller may try and work with us to allow me to start moving my things in so that the day of closing on my current house, I can take possession of then new one without having to try and shuffle things around. Very, very good news indeed as I was starting to think there might be a couple days where I was technically without a home. So, fingers crossed. Deep breaths. Hopefully smooth sailing from here on out.

Got a pretty big couple of weeks coming up. Sold the house tonight so things will be changing very rapidly. I’ll be looking at one more towards my work location which is also closer to my parents. That should be good for everyone involved. Next up will be my tattoo. Yup. Finally getting it. A week from Friday, Jeremy at Revolution Ink will be inking my Edgar Allen Poe inspired tattoo. I’m crazy excited about finally getting it done. It will most likely be the first of many, I’m sure. I’m also looking into maybe playing some music, as in, playing for a public audience. My bud Seth is a great singer and for quite some time he’s been wanting us to perform together. Me on the guitar and him with the vocals. So, I think with all of the changes that have been coming around it’s time for me to push myself and see if I can make some music outside of my own walls for once. So, from here on out, things should really get interesting and I’ll be sure and chronicle as much of it as possible right here.

I really never thought I’d get to add this one to my list of found species. Granted, black widows are not exactly uncommon in this area, but it’s just not a common occurrence in my day-to-day life. So, I was very happy (yes, happy) when my friends from work told me they had spotted one by their church. Of course, my first reaction was doubt. Not that I really didn’t believe them, I just know how easy it is to make a false ID on any wildlife since I’ve been the culprit many times myself. But when they loaded up the pictures and showed me, I knew I had to go capture it. Not that I really had any need to capture it, except for preventing it from harming anyone AND preventing anyone from harming her. As evident in the picture, the widow had two egg sacs that she was closely guarding. I planned to grab them too. I was very excited and thought about the capture all day at work, planning how I would collect both the widow and her eggs without causing damage to her or getting tagged myself. Finally then last bell rang and I was on my way. As soon as we arrived at the church, I was directed to a pile of sandbags stacked against the stone foundation. Pealing one of the bags back slowly, I could see her with both eggs sacs pulled close. She was hanging upside down with her abdomen facing me, displaying that infamous blood red hourglass. Once the sandbag was out of the way, I started to close my container around her and the eggs. She didn’t really try and make any moves at first, but then broke away from her web and started up the wall. I covered her with the lid and slid it just enough to bump her with the side. She instantly balled up and fell into the container. Then it was just a matter of collecting the egg sacs while keeping an eye on her to make sure she didn’t crawl up for a quick bite. So, what do you do with a highly venomous spider and two egg sacs?? You take them to someone that shares the same excitement, but has the knowledge and resources to properly interact with such a creature. For me, that was Dr. John Foster over at the Wesselman Woods Nature Preserve. I sped over to the front nature center office, hoping to make it there before everyone went home. As luck would have it, I caught them as they were leaving and quickly explained the situation. They directed me to Dr. Foster, and he in turn greeted me with the kind of enthusiasm that only a trained entomologist could have for an animal like this. My only regret, is that I didn’t take time to get some good pictures of her or to find out what Dr. Foster had planned for the widow and her brood. But, I sent him an email which I hope will lead to more pictures and info. I’ll be sure to post any updates I find out, but in the mean time, here is the great photo that Annabell was kind enough to take for me.

Black Widow with eggs

I should have known this was going to happen. I’ve been so happy and positive the past few days and I really thought I was going to stay that way. Well, no dice. Took a little nap this evening and woke up around 9pm. I awoke into one of the most depressed, anguish and hate filled moods I’ve ever felt. I literally thought I might have snapped. Pacing the house sobbing one minute and then beating my fists against anything close, the next. I guess I was bottling some things up and they finally just had to get out. Truth be told, I can’t stand this house at night. My bed should not be empty and the rooms should sound of more then TV shows and aquarium pumps. There almost could be a formula for how emotions express themselves. Two parts happy to one part sad makes a disinterested mood. But mix anguish, loneliness and regret together, you get a pretty explosive rage filled time bomb. I guess I’m going to have to learn to vent the negative as well as project the positive. After all, I talk about balance all the time. You can’t have balance without some darkness.

I was craving the woods this morning so I decided to go walk the trails at Scott Township Park. Nothing crazy now, I’m no off-road explorer. But I was hoping to maybe see a deer or groundhog or whatever so I didn’t want to just walk the gravel road. I opted for the Oak Trail and I have to say, I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a good walk through some beautiful forest. The trail dips at first but then steadily climbs before leveling off for awhile. Then once you make it around the main bend, it drops back down and you’re reward with an absolutely gorgeous view of the lake. Make sure you walk out to the end of the floating dock. It feels awesome as the water drifts back and forth. Overall, the “hike” took about 30 minutes and was just under half a mile long. Next time I’ll take the Upland Trail. It’s more difficult terrain but hopefully it will yield more to see. Here is an overview of the trail as well as the track view I recorded on my phone and a pic of the lake (although even an HDR photo doesn’t come close to seeing it for real).

Yet another beautiful night. The moon looks incredible peeking out from behind the clouds like it’s shy and doesn’t quite know if it can trust me to fully show itself. God truly is a remarkable artist.

Today was not as good as past days have been. I’ve been dealing with some allergies and it’s made me a little grumpy which in turn, makes everything else that’s going on seem a little worse. I guess it’s just what you’d call a bad day. Anyway, it got me to sit and write a quick verse so it wasn’t all bad. I normally use rhyme in my poems, but I’ve been reading a lot of writing on poem.org and it’s starting to break me of that habit. So bear with me as I cut my teeth on a new style.

Compression :: written August 31, 2011

with all my feelings packed down inside
my view of life becomes skewed
nothing falls into it’s correct place
every point offset by my level of compression
with time, i hope to expand again
and learn to live 1:1

Things are looking much better today. Emily and I had a great talk last night and although we’re still not going to stay together, we both agree that it’s the best for both of us and we can work together as friends to get through all of this with as little stress on each other as possible. It was a huge relief and makes the future seem a little less scary and a little more exciting.

Inspiration

Wrap it up.

Moving on…

Let the games begin

Black Widow

How quickly things can change.

Great nature walk

Just relaxing

Not so much…

Much better today.