The boys (Matt, Ron and Cody) went out on a hunting party today to see if maybe a little deer might not be on the menu for tonight or the next few days. Frank and I headed over to the river to see if maybe we could get some trout to add to the food options. But I think the fishing thing was more to give me a little grounding and a chance to let the murder stuff just float around in my head. There is something I am missing.
It seems that the fish are more than happy to rub in my lack of fishing skills, I caught nothing.
I received some interesting information from the boys when I got back. Matt could not swear to it, but he felt that they had been watched while they were out hunting. He also said that he found some trails out there that we maybe want to explore. We have not really done a lot of looking around outside the camp in the way of scouting.
There was an unusual event today with about a dozen Zoms hitting the fence line. It was odd because we do not usually see groups or packs of them traveling together. John, Margo and a couple of others took care of the problem. I saw them dragging the bodies to the pit for burning. It is just a sick observation but after the kerosene smell burns off the roasting remains do have a kind of BBQ smell to them. I know it is messed up and we are not the Donner Party.
August 13th
Cyril caught up with me this morning; “Biter was acting up again last night.”
“Really? What time?”
“Late, but I can’t read my watch anymore at night so I am not exactly sure.”
I had Lance check the videos but we had nothing.
I guess that I should explain our camera system a little. What we were able to do is find a low-light surveillance system with eight cameras at the local Best Buy. We actually grabbed two of them and were able to set them up at various locations around the camp. The coverage included the main gate and a number of directions from the big main building. We also had a few aimed at sensitive areas such as the food locker and some of the interior areas where important things were stored like extra guns and ammunition. The system is based upon Wi-Fi technology so we do not have to hard wire any of it.
Steven is still pretty bummed out about the helicopter and is now thinking that he needs to run down to Rhinebeck to look at the equipment down there to see if there were parts that he could salvage. There was a military chopper down there, but I don’t know how much of it was still usable. I thought that it had been stripped of running parts and was just a shell. But maybe he can get something from it.
Our issues with the radiation seem to have remained stable for the last month. I am not sure why, but it is good because maybe it was just a temporary issue and now we are clear of the heavier dosages.
Another day was spent gathering food down in Peru. Although there was damage done to the crops we still have much available for harvesting. The trees that we had cut down in the spring are reaching a point where it has dried enough to start bringing in and setting up for our needs through the winter.
Camp Romaca was a summer camp, and throughout the time since we moved in much of our focus was to prepare it for the winter. We have been insulating as much as we could to make the places more survivable. But there are going to be issues. We do have the electric sources from the two wind turbines as well as from the solar panels that were at the camp when we got here. And we have also the two military generators from Major Barkley’s unit here to keep things going. It is still likely that we will transition from what we have now to more Spartan conditions come December. There is a sense of urgency for winter preparation.
August 14th
Another group of about six Zoms showed up overnight. This is really odd because it has never been as consistent with groups or multiples. We have gotten one or two coming together but this is really the first time that they have showed up repeatedly in larger groups. It almost makes me think that there is intelligence behind it. We responded as we typically do and ended the threat quickly.
Margo gave me an interesting observation this morning, it was about John.
“He has a rather weird way of killing the Zoms, he attacks from behind and pokes a hole in the back of the skull at the base and then he slashes their throats.”
I know why she told me that and I would be watching for it from now on.
The rest of the day was spent doing busy work like harvesting, loading wood and a host of other menial tasks. In the afternoon we had another thunderstorm. It seems that we get one almost every afternoon. I do not remember that happening before The Event.
August 15th
Last night was quiet, no Biter barking, and no Zoms on the wire. It was nice to get a quiet night. This morning over breakfast I talked to Anne about her research. She said that there really was not a lot going on at this point. We had nothing new to go on and although she and Major Barkley had periodic talks they were pretty much just a rehash of the same old stuff. But I did get the scoop on Charlene and the Major, they are hot and heavy.
After Breakfast I stopped by to see Lance. I wanted to see if we had any photos of the back of Alyssa’s head. I remember that we took some photos but I did not remember doing a lot of close up stuff. There really seemed to be no need as the cause of death was pretty apparent. Unfortunately I could not see anything that would show a wound or blow to the back of the head.
At the lunch meal Teckla announced that the biker group would be joining, there was a little grumbling by a few at first. But when Teckla laid out the situation and that the bikers could not survive even a mild winter as they were now there was less grumbling.
Another aspect of this which I feel bad in bringing up is the fact that most of the people joining us were women. And they were of child bearing age. I know it sounds shitty but if we are going to survive, if humanity is going to survive, well, you understand.
August 16th
Again a pretty much typical day, we spent time doing winter preparations like insulation and such. I cannot believe that it is six months since this mess all started. We have done well in getting this far. The harvest, despite the tornado has been pretty successful thanks to Henry and Matt. We will probably be able to eat through the winter. Nick and Grace, with the help of Arcelia, have been canning things like beans and tomatoes.
Anne and the Major really have nothing new in the research department of what we can do to avoid the disease, other than not die. Armand and Cody have been working on the electrical systems to keep power up and running should we see severe weather that blocks the solar cells or wind turbines.
I am not sure if I ever discussed that aspect of Camp Romaca. One of the many reasons that we chose this place had to do with the two wind turbines that existed on a nearby hill. It has, by our best reckoning, the ability to supply the camp with enough electric power to pretty much run everything, lights, pumps, refrigeration and so on. The camp also had solar panels on the roofs of many of the cabins that could supply some of the hot water for showers, and washing.
The one problem that I see with the solar cells is that if we have a severe winter, which based on the past few years it’s a real possibility we could see them snow-covered and not working well, or at all.
Taylor and Chelsea arrived today and began to set up their new home. There was a little interest by some of the single guys, Lance, Ron, and Ethan. Ah, to be young and have raging hormones.
August 17th
The rest of the biker crowd moved in today. We have to open up a couple of cabins and move some folks around to get enough space for the new additions. Nick moved in with Jan and Fred. Billy moved in with John, now that is an odd couple for sure.
Anne’s folks talked about moving in with us but five people in one of those cabins was a little tight and we had to have a little chat early on to discuss that. I love her folks dearly, but they can be a little over the top some times in their need to talk.
We also created Girl’s and Boy’s dorms. There were a couple of larger cabins that had been for kitchen and specialty staff. This allowed for Heather, Ta
ylor and Chelsea to create a girl’s cabin and Lance, Cody and Ethan to have a boy’s cabin. As it turned out, we had enough room with a little bit to spare.
August 18th
Everyone has pretty much moved in and it is clear that there is some polarization of the two factions by some, but for the most part everyone is being cordial and getting along. One of the things that I noticed very quickly was that Tanya, Anne and Charlene have been spending some time together in some kind of pow-wow. I am not sure what the nature of it is but a gathering of she-lions cannot be good. I am sure there will be some tasks for us to come out of it.
It is very difficult to describe the curious interactions by the members of the group. Some are very clear and obvious. There are the romantic connections, those are easy to determine. Many like Frank and Teckla, Anne and I, Nick and, sorry….were established since day one. Some have been going on for months as in the case of Charlene and the Major, Jan and Fred, or Grace and Armand. We will start to see some new bonds being made. It is kind of fun to speculate who will hook up with who, and as long as it works, then good for them.
August 19th
I think the “Air Force’ just got a little wake up call. Steven arrived this morning at about 10 AM in the helicopter he had been working on. Scared the be-Jesus out of a few folks who did not know he was working on it. One of the advantages with the helicopter is that it uses Kerosene for fuel. This is a much more abundant resource to us than aviation fuel. In the long term it puts it in a fuel share with most of the cars and trucks that we have gathered over time. It was a morning of chopper rides for those interested. He did a great job getting it up and running.
Our little community is growing, and we are now up to thirty one. We have lost a few along the way, but overall our efforts at survival have been pretty successful. We have withstood attacks from rival groups, small hordes of Zoms, and some weather issues. But we are yet to face what I am thinking is going to be our greatest challenge and that will be the winter. A lot of it is going to depend upon what happens with the weather. A mild winter would be very good but if we get something on the heavy snow or cold side things will be hard. We are still preparing, and I think that we are moving in the right direction, but staying warm and fed will be a challenge. We have been kind of spoiled in our abundance so far.
August 20th
Everyone is still settling in and getting used to each other. I have seen some interactions between a number of the two sides (us and the bikers) and I really should not be saying the two sides, we are all one side now. We all need to have the same goal of survival of the community.
I stopped by to visit Nick this morning. He is doing pretty well, not great. It has not been that long since the loss of Lauren and how does one put the recovery and grieving process in a time line. I recall the way he dealt with Mom and Dad’s passing and he seems to be handling this better.
Margo has been doing some scouting out on her own. I know that Anne would not be happy about it but she is well suited for the task. She usually brings back a rabbit or two. Sometimes Cody goes out with her and it is funny to watch him. He is really just like a little puppy following her around and at times, I think she kind of likes the attention.
Jan and Fred are doing well. They have become kind of inseparable. With the reduction in flights Jan has been a little more comfortable with the pilot role that Fred has. He has been really good to her from what I can see.
I have also noticed that there is already some interaction between the ‘Girls’ and ‘Boys’ Dorms. Note to self: next time anyone goes into town, perhaps a little ‘drugstore’ visit would be in order. Not yet, but soon.
August 21st.
I still have nothing on the murder. I have nothing to go on, and no way can I really prove anything. I can only hope for an eventual slip up. Undead visits have been sparse over the last few days so I have been unable to check out the information that Margo told me about John and his kill methods.
August 22nd
Another storm last night, not terrible, there were no tornados, but it was quite the light show. We had five Zoms show up on the wire this morning but nothing that we could not easily handle.
Anne, Charlene and Tanya have been talking, and that always scares me (humor). Tanya had been doing a lot of natural medicine stuff with the other group when they were on their own. Her thought is that as medications become increasingly difficult to find and with winter coming in it might be a good idea to stock up on herbs and natural remedies. It actually is a good idea. Not only does it help us out in the short term but also is really something to think about in the long haul. There will come a time when the old meds that we have acquired run out or just plain expire. And (I will be positive here) the future generations will need these means of medicating to help them survive. They have enlisted the aid of the Major who can help them equate certain medical things. It gives Anne a new research focus for her working with the library.
I should talk about the overall health of the group. We have all lost weight, and really the fat to weight ratio (BMI?) is excellent. I know that I was a type two diabetic at the beginning of this mess and now, well, on the last A1C blood check I was normal. We had acquired a lot of medical materials from small walk-in clinics and hospitals and have been able to do some testing and checking on certain things. We do not have X-ray or such, but we can check blood sugars, cholesterol, and blood pressures. It is kind of interesting that the Major has been more “Doc”, a good old fashion country doctor. Which ironically, it was what he had always wanted to be.
August 23rd
With the new people coming on board, and things kind of settling down there is actually a lot more activity of late. Or maybe it was there all along and I was just in a haze thinking about the killing of Alyssa.
Henry and Matt have still been bringing in the crops, and Nick has still been putting together miracle meals from ingredients that I would never have considered as workable together. He probably would have done well in an old world TV series that we knew as ‘Chopped’.
In that series the contestants, all of whom were chefs from small to medium sized venues would compete in making three course meals under a time limit. They would be supplied with a basket containing four different ingredients that may not have seemed to fit together, like duck, leeks, brown mustard and Reece’s pieces. Then they were expected to make a dish out of it. The weakest dish was ‘Chopped’ and that chef sent home.
Mark and Steven have been doing some more work on the helicopter while the rest of the Fly-Boys, as they like to call themselves, have been going throught the fixed wing air craft to make certain they are ready to go. It seems a friendly little rivalry had begun to develop between the two types of flyers.
Margo has been doing a lot of scouting around the camp. She has turned from nerdling into huntress and often on her trips into the woods came back with some meat. Her new choice of weapon for these treks is a crossbow. Cody often accompanies her, and from what I have seen he is not bad in the wild either, but I think sometimes she gets annoyed with him being along. They seem to have a relationship, but there is something about a little free space and time that she enjoys and is her escape.
I find that this journal is kind of my escape. It gives me a chance to stretch and exercise my mind a little bit. But it also allows me to reflect on events, relive or remember things from the past and how it was in the days before The Event. It also sometimes makes me wonder who will ever read this, if anyone. I like to think that “The Chronicles of Tom” would have been a best seller, but more realistically I just hope that if anyone does ever read it that they understand who we were and how we got as far as we did before…..
August 24th
Word has gotten out about the homeopathic medicine ideas and it has created a little stir, not because of the idea that we will eventually run out of medications, and for that matter many other “old world things”. But in some of the ideas and methods that people have thought up for conserva
tion and replacements.
One of the big surprises was Michelle. She was a stripper in the old world, and has as a result been stereotyped as a few things; not being very bright was one of them. The others include some questions of her morality, but she seems to have been hooked up with Mark for a while now and she has never been anything but his partner/soul mate.
Anyway, one of the things that we discovered about her is that she was in her college years a botany student with a keen interest in medicinal/herbal agriculture. She had studied the very complex roles that plants and herbs can play in healing. As soon as she heard about the project and Anne’s new research pursuit she injected herself in to the group and supplied a list of books that would be very helpful to the work. Be it stereotyping, or whatever else you might consider a number of the women have taken an interest in the project and volunteered to go out and be gatherers.
August 25th
Biter was acting up a little last night around 3 AM. Lance checked the cameras and the footage and found that there was someone out there; it was clearly not a Zom. It was moving very smoothly and with purpose. It just stayed along the fence line near that trail we found behind the shed where Alyssa had been killed.
The Event Series (Book 1): Life After the Meteor Page 27
