On a side note, it’s bordering on chilly in here. We’ve had the air cranked down ever since the power came back on to get it as cold as possible just in case it cuts out again.
8:09 p.m.
That was actually kind of fun. We haven’t played Yahtzee in years. AJ won! He actually got a Yahtzee! I came close, but no cigar. Liz came in second. We won’t mention who lost. I missed the top-line bonus by ONE POINT! Stupid “ones” category killed me. Any other time, that’s all I get, but when I need them, I could only roll two. Oh well, it could be worse.
Speaking of which, let me get back to the parking lot incident from earlier today. I really don’t want to rehash it since I’m actually feeling a bit better, but I should, just to get my thoughts down on paper and relieve some of the angst. It won’t be enough, but it’s not like I want to go talk about it with Liz. She has troubles enough just trying to cope with her parental situation, her diminishing hope of returning to work anytime soon, and all the rest that’s going on.
So we had the aid convoy in the parking lot, and they were pretty much just checking on the condo residents to see if we needed anything, which we really didn’t – other than information that is. About the only thing that these people were able to relate was that most everyone who is still alive is pretty much in the same boat. No one has heard anything from government agencies regarding any sort of coordinated response to the flu. There still hasn’t been any word of a cure, and from what the convoy said they’d seen as they’d traveled up and down A1A, the mortality rate among area residents is substantial to say the least. They noted that probably eight or nine out of every ten homes they visited was non-responsive to their assistance efforts.
They also told us that many of the more populated condo buildings were in even worse shape when it came to mortality rates. They said that we were lucky that most of our units were empty. Buildings with higher occupancy rates had a higher likelihood of flu infection since it spread through the residents like wildfire.
Regardless, it sounds like Cocoa Beach has quickly become a ghost town. The aid convoy told us that the rotting remnants of residents are everywhere since there are too few people left to bury the dead. In some areas, residents tried to burn bodies, but that only attracted the wrong type of people – renegade scavengers – those who are willing to add to the body count in an effort to steal any remaining supplies.
We were in the midst of telling them about our own experience with similar people (the Dan and Angie incident), when several larger vehicles – pickups and SUVs – came tearing into our parking lot, blocking in the aid convoy vehicles. At first, we thought they were associated with the convoy. It quickly became apparent that this was not the case when heavily-armed men jumped from the vehicles and began shooting at the aid convoy members.
It was a massacre.
We saw five people killed right in front of us. Assault-rifle-fired rounds ripped through the small group of aid workers standing below us. They killed all but one man in the group who was taken down a few seconds later as he ran for his vehicle.
The rest of the aid convoy made a feeble attempt at self-preservation. Several of them tried to make a break for it. The men with guns made quick work of them, gunning them down in the parking lot. Several other aid workers hopped in their vehicles and fired up the engines. The men with guns either shot through the vehicle windshields to kill the occupants inside or they shot out the tires and then riddled the immobilized vehicles with countless rounds until the occupants within were no more.
It was a ghastly scene; a scene that those of us observing from the condo building didn’t stick around to watch once the shooting stopped. We all hustled (as best as old people can “hustle”) back to our condos to lock and barricade ourselves inside, praying that killing us wasn’t next on the assault-rifle group’s to-do list.
Obviously we’re all okay now, but we had no idea whether we would be at the time. Thankfully, the guys with the guns must have been satisfied with taking the aid convoy supplies. It’s unfortunate in numerous ways. It’s unfortunate for the poor members of the convoy who lay sprawled dead across our parking lot. It’s unfortunate for the people they were trying to help. And it’s unfortunate for us because we’re going to have to clean up the mess down there.
At least we’re still alive.
11:03 p.m.
I just got in from body hauling. Jesus. I never thought I’d write that. What the hell?! This is what life has come to. I can’t believe it has only been a week since this flu thing really kicked off in earnest. It’s amazing how quickly stuff has gone from completely normal to absolutely insane. I guess there’s no schedule for the apocalypse. It just does its thing – runs rampant, wreaks havoc, and suddenly you’re in “Planet of the Apes” or “Zombieland” or “World War Z” or “Bird Box” or whatever the hell it is we have going on here. I guess that you could call this the Plague on steroids!
It totally feels like the Plague considering we just came back inside from using wheelbarrows to cart bodies from our parking lot out to the street. We piled them beside A1A in hopes that maybe someone will come along and dispose of them. I totally doubt it, but I guess we can hope. Even Liz came out to help. It was pretty much all hands on deck since we wanted to get the bodies out of our parking lot and back to the safety of our condos as quickly as possible in case those dudes with guns came back.
About the only ones who didn’t help beside Ruth Benson were the girls and AJ. It wasn’t that we didn’t want the kids’ energetic assistance; it was that we didn’t want to scar them with images of the dead people we were hauling.
While we were out there, we realized that the guys with guns had ransacked the clubhouse. They stole not just all the food we had in there, but they took John’s generator, which is a huge loss to the condo building as a whole. I was hoping to use it to keep some of our remaining refrigerated food fresh should the power go out again. But now, it looks like we’ll just have to hold our breath and pray that doesn’t happen.
As we finished up with our macabre work outside, it began to rain. It was a hard driving rain that sent us hustling back inside. That’s fine with me. It seems like something bad happens every time we’re outside anyway. I’d just as soon be indoors and away from the type of people who seem to enjoy roaming the landscape these days.
Annnnnd now the power is off again. Great…just great!
September 11th
9:05 a.m.
The rain kept it dark this morning which helped us sleep in a little bit. Still, it was hard to really get into a deep slumber because of the heat. With the power off, the ambient air temperature inside is on the rise again. Even though I was able to get the temperature down to the mid-60s before we lost power, it has risen by about nine degrees throughout the night.
I guess another good thing about the rain is that it has kept the sun at bay, which should hopefully help keep temperatures down.
I could tell that Liz was having trouble sleeping. She kept tossing and turning throughout the night. I really didn’t want her out there helping with body removal, but she insisted. I didn’t like the fact that my wonderful wife was out and exposed to the same dangers that had us cleaning up almost a dozen corpses. Nor did I like the fact that she had to see some of the same gruesome gore that I had experienced with Dan and Angie. But she forged ahead like a real trooper. I’m proud of her. I just wish she didn’t have to do it. Heck, I wish I didn’t have to do it.
It’s weird that it’s September 11th. I still remember when the planes struck the World Trade Towers. That moment must have been for me like when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor for that generation of youngsters – or maybe like the Su flu is for AJ. The difference is that the nation came back from things like Pearl Harbor and 9/11. I’m not sure we’ll come back from this. One thing is for certain – much like those other previous dark days of history – things will never be the same afterward.
11:44 a.m.
The power is still off.
Liz wants to sit down and come up with a plan. I asked her, “A plan for what?”
She said she wants to know what we’re going to do if the power doesn’t come back on or the situation doesn’t change and we’re stranded here indefinitely.
They’re good questions – ones I wish I had the answers to.
12:43 p.m.
It’s still raining. It’s really coming down. I wonder if it’s a tropical storm or something. No way of knowing without television, or phones, or newspapers or something! ANYTHING! I can’t express how completely annoying it is being constantly in the dark (both figuratively and literally with the power out again).
All the lunch meat and cheese is pretty much gone so we ate some hot dogs I warmed on the grill. I used to love grilling here. Now it’s not so much fun. It’s more of a means to an end.
I closed the hurricane shutters while I cooked so that I wouldn’t be seen by anyone on the beach or down in the beach access parking lot. It was weird – like grilling in a cave. I would close the shutters completely but for that fact that it helps substantially with air flow to our condo, especially when the air is off (which it still is).
So while we ate, I talked with Liz and AJ. I think our boy deserves to be involved in what’s going on. While he won’t be making the decisions, I at least want him informed and to hear his input. Even though he’s a kid, he’s a pretty darn smart kid, and sometimes the way he thinks about things amazes me.
We discussed the flu, we discussed the people who are dead and dying out there, we talked about home, and we talked about what we should do.
I don’t know if all the talking got us very far, but we at least had a chance to voice our thoughts, our opinions, our fears, and our hopes.
AJ’s fears are fitting for a 12-year-old. He worries about his room back home and his video game console. He’s afraid someone might break in and steal it. He’s worried about his friends. He’s worried about missing school – not that he’s not there, but that he might be held back a grade for missing too much of the school year. I explained to him that kids around the country are all in the same boat. Then he started to worry that he might have to go to summer school if school doesn’t start back soon or that he might be behind on his college plan. I told him not to worry about that stuff now and that the school administrators will figure all that out when the time comes.
Liz is still fretting about her parents. I don’t want to sound callous, and I get her concern, but in the overall scheme of things, I’d say it’s minor in comparison to our situation here. And what the heck can we do about it anyway? I mean, it’s sad as hell, but it’s not like we have any control over it. We hardly have any control over our OWN situation!
Liz didn’t mention going back to work, which is good. I think it means she’s starting to come around to our new reality. She’s focusing on our situation here rather than worrying about back home. Plus, that’s what I’M for.
I’m worried about EVERYTHING – work and our livelihood, bills, our home, and not least of all, US! But again, what the heck can I do about it? Not much. All I can really do is focus on the here and now.
This brings me to our plan…if you can call it that. It’s mostly a plan that revolves around staying put at the condo. But even staying put requires some level of planning (especially with the power out) since we have no idea how long we’ll be here or what the conditions will be.
Therefore, we decided that it’s time to get organized. We probably should have done this a couple days ago, but hindsight is 20/20. I think we’ve done pretty well considering our situation and our overall unprepared nature for a pandemic the likes of which the world has never seen.
So the first part of our plan involves getting a better food rationing system in place. No more snacking without permission. No more extra servings at meals. We really have to start conserving what we have left if we want it to last. I’d say we probably have a couple weeks worth of food on hand, maybe a little longer, but it could also be a little shorter if we don’t maximize our supplies. And that means cooking the meat in the freezer ASAP if the power doesn’t come on in the next 24 hours. If we lose the meats we have frozen, we could be losing not only a week’s worth of meals or more, but also our greatest source of protein. I’m not a nutritionist or anything, but I know what it’s like to go without meat for a few days, and I don’t like it.
The second part of our plan involves making a directional shift in our outlooks. So far, we’ve remained law-abiding citizens, hiding away in our hovel, content to keep to ourselves and wait for help to come. This has worked so far, except that I don’t think that help is coming. Other than the aid convoy (which was thoroughly decimated), we haven’t seen hide nor hair of any organized assistance. Therefore, it appears that it’s up to us to fend for ourselves. And unfortunately, to do so, we need to take a different approach to things. It’s not that we’re going to become the types of people who killed Dan and Angie or who destroyed the aid convoy, but we need to start adapting to our new environment. Law and order as we once knew it, no longer exists. That means we must rely more upon our moral and ethical principles as human beings while ignoring some of those prior standards that governed a reasonably civilized society.
What I mean by this is that we have a multitude of condos around us, condos that are owned by people who either can’t get to them or who are – and not to be crass here – dead already. And there are likely a variety of supplies available inside those condos. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a proponent of stealing. But the food in those condos is likely to go bad eventually. The problem is that I don’t want to go around kicking in doors. I mean, people still live here, and I don’t want them to think we’re as bad as the convoy killers. Therefore, I’m thinking that I should go to John. As condo board president, he has keys to all the condos. Maybe he’ll agree to let us in to take useable supplies for the good of the remaining residents. If not, well, I guess we’ll figure that out if or when we come to it.
1:54 p.m.
John wasn’t hot on my idea of entering other residents’ condos. I told him that I don’t particularly love the idea either, but at some point in the near future, it might be a forced option.
He begrudgingly agreed, but he said we should wait and see if this thing doesn’t resolve itself in the next few days. I told him that I was willing to wait for a little while, but if the power stays off, waiting might hurt since food will be spoiling, especially if this rain passes and the sun comes back out. Condos that are buttoned up without power and without fresh air can quickly become breeding grounds for mold, mold that can cover walls, ruin food, and make the units uninhabitable.
Since it’s raining out, I’m going to go out and try cooking some of our own meats that are beginning to thaw. Cooking in front of a hot grill, when I can’t come inside and cool down in the air conditioning afterward, isn’t my idea of a good time. But I’d rather eat this stuff than let it go bad.
3:33 p.m.
Well that sucked! Things started out fine at first. I cooked a bunch of Polish sausage, a couple steaks, and a few chicken breasts. Then I started cooking hamburgers. That’s where I encountered issues, issues that I should have foreseen before I started.
About halfway through the burgers, the grease started to drip, and the burgers started to flame up. I turned the heat down, but the burgers were already putting out a lot of smoke, so I closed the grill’s lid to quash the flames and try to contain the smoke. That helped a little, but not enough. Even with the hurricane shutters closed, scented burger smoke was wafting from our balcony, and I suddenly realized that I was sending out a visible and olfactory alert that we were not only living here, but that we had food…GOOD food no less.
I therefore turned the grill down as low as I could to still keep the burgers cooking but at the same time kill as much of the smoke as possible.
I think my tactic worked – hopefully. I just pray that it didn’t attract any of the wrong people. That’s another good thing abo
ut the rain. It will keep people indoors, so maybe no one was around to see or smell the idiotic smoke signals I was sending out.
Uh oh, someone’s knocking at the door.
4:44 p.m.
Thank god! It was only Gerald Phillips. He wanted to know if he could use our grill to cook some of his own food since no one has a way to cook indoors anymore without electricity. I told him he was more than welcome to cook his food here as long as he’s careful (I explained my own experience). He just left after grilling some fish and chicken breasts that had begun to thaw in this heat.
We’re going to have a feast tonight for dinner with all this stuff I’ve cooked. We have to eat it fairly quickly if the power doesn’t come back on since our coolers will only keep it cold for so long.
Now I’m heading for a cold shower (at least the water is still working…for the moment). I need it. I smell like barbeque.
6:58 p.m.
That was a delicious dinner of burgers and chicken breasts with a can of corn (warmed over the grill) as a side. But our enjoyment of dinner has been tempered by the realization that we’ve lost water service.
This changes things completely. While we have plenty of drinking water at our disposal for the moment, things like hand washing, showering, brushing teeth, and flushing the toilet will now all have to be tempered.
I wonder how the others are doing. After this, I’m going to check on Ruth Benson since she’s all alone.
The Dystopian Diaries Page 67
