Not Dead in the Heart of Dixie (49 page)

I fear someone getting hurt when they take the little wooden building off the flatbed and place it on top of the hole. None of us have “outhouse building experience
.”

Pop's stuck in the motorhome
, but he'll watch them through the window and scream directions their way. Hisa doesn't want him out in the rain because he is still in bed a lot of the day and she doesn't want him to catch pneumonia.

Mr. Hobbs won't have to worry about watering the garden and plan
s to be on backhoe duty after the outhouse is dug. The backhoe has an enclosed cab. I just hope he doesn't get it stuck. He'll be picking up dirt behind the Masterson house. The road has lots of packed down gravel, and he plans to stay on it as much as possible. Deuce said the road goes all the way back behind the horse barn.

Jesse was
gonna go back to the Hobbs house today, but Hisa doesn't want him out in the rain either. I expect Carisa to spend a lot of time with him at Clinic Diane since she and the girls can't do laundry in the rain.

Dane wants to take Jeremy and Rebecca to loot the remaining houses on the other side of the woods. Maybe it's a good thing that it's raining today. We can get a few things done other than working on the fence.

Marisa's calling my name. I guess it's time to get wet and get strawberries planted. See ya later.

3:30 PM...

I came in to stir the stroganoff and turn the temperature up. Everything is looking, and smelling, really good.

We had PB &J sandwiches for lunch. Nana had to make three loaves of bread to feed us all. Homemade bread loaves are not as long as store bought bread and it's hard to slice it as thin. We ate two large bags of Ruffles Potato chips with our sandwiches.

Dane, Jeremy, and Rebecca brought the chips home from a house they looted. They brought home quite a bit of canned food
. They also got a 10 pound bag of flour and a four pound bag of sugar along with salt and other spices. There were several unopened condiments in the pantry.

They also brought home a generator the same size as ours. No one has laid claim to it yet.

The strawberry bed is together and filled with soil. Rona and Marisa are across the woods, getting the strawberry plants right now. They took Luke and Larson to keep watch.

Kevin and Deuce are in the meadow
, trying to teach Buttercup to pull logs. They're wearing rain slickers that Rona had in the motorhome.

During lunch
, Dane told us that refrigerated trailers don't need big rigs to run. They have their own independent fuel tanks and switches on the outside to turn them on and off. Mick immediately decided that we need one of the refrigerated trailers from the trucking company. They plan to go out for it this afternoon if the outhouse is finished.

They have the backhoe and flatbed trailer with the two little buildings on top up here now. I'm not watching.

I think I hear Rona, back with the strawberry plants.

See ya later.

11:30 PM

The beef stroganoff was a big hit. Everyone loved it and nothing was left. That was good for my ego.

Buttercup is a natural
“log pullin’ horse.” Kevin said they got half the load moved over to the fence area this afternoon. That's a good thing. It'll save our gasoline and fuel. We need to take very good care of her and not work her too hard.

I have no idea how to trim horse feet but I watched it happen many times when my grandfather had horses. I might have to use my goat hoof trimmers
to get the job done. I think I have a file in with my goat supplies as well. Deuce adores her. He's been riding her bareback the past few days. I think she likes it too.

We have a deluxe outhouse. It's in place and we need to cut the hole in the floor and make the “sittin' bench.” Jeremy and Mr. Hobbs can work on
it tomorrow. It looks huge for an outhouse. I guess we can store other non-edible things if we have to.

I am scared to death that I'll see a snake in there when
spring comes. I will freak out. I hate snakes of any kind and I'm extremely worried about flies, especially killer HDI flies.

Mick says there will be barrels in the bottom of the holes beneath the seats. The barrels will be changed out at least once a week, maybe twice a week in summer. So
, I guess we'll need at least two more barrels 'cause I'm not giving up any of the water barrels.

The waste will be taken away and burned. The barrels will
be bleached in water from the creek before they bring them back. I don't know how to burn human waste. I'm glad the men will be taking care of it. Mick says they’ll dispose of it down at the power lines where we've been burning HDI bodies.

We need li
me so we can sprinkle dirt and lime into the barrel every day or two. Maybe flies hate lime. Mick and Dane said there's lime at TSC and Lowe's. I guess we'll be making a trip.

Mick is hoping for nice weather tomorrow 'cause it's his turn to operate the backhoe.

Dane found nothing in two of the house trailers across the woods. He said they were empty of furniture and everything else. There's one more house over there and I'm sure we'll get to it soon.

I finished putting the cherries on Carisa's cake a few minutes ago. It's ready for her birthday tomorrow. I set it on the buffet with her presents around it so she'll see it when she walks down the hall. It's not every day that your baby turns sweet sixteen.

The strawberry plants are in the ground. That strawberry bed looks so pretty. We put straw around the base of the plants to keep the moisture in and the weeds out. We didn't need to water them since it was raining.

I finally got dried off
after supper. Dry clothes are wonderful things. Everyone went home right after supper. I don't think anyone wanted to sit around and talk in wet clothes.

I'm pleasantly exhausted and would have been asleep already if I didn't make the birthday cake. I guess I could have made it tomorrow morning. Oh well, it's done and I'm headed to bed.

Bye for now.

Saturday
, March 15

I'll do anything for my sweet sixteen, and I'll do any
thing for little run away child. Oh sweet sixteen. Oh sweet sixteen – Billy Idol

Happy Birthday to Carisa! She's still sleeping because it's her birthday and because she can. It's hard, waiting for her to get up. I'm anxious to see if she likes her presents.

I had to “fix” the cake this morning because I caught Carisa's cat licking frosting off the side. Shhh, don't tell anyone.

We all got a gift this morning. Jeremy went to take hay to the cows and found one of them in labor. It was Geraldine, and she looked like she was having a tough time.

We had to help by pulling the calf. Man, it's a lot different than pulling a baby goat. For a few minutes there, I was convinced that the cow had a magic
, sucking, black hole of a vagina. It was hard to get the baby out of there, and it took two of the men to do it.

The calf is already the same size as our little miniature does. I'm extremely glad that we prepped with goats instead of cattle.

Anyway, it's a bull. This means we can breed our cows for milk and meat. I don't even know the gestation period for cattle. I'll have to ask Pop. He worked on a cattle farm when he was a teenager.

Cows eat a huge amount hay. I'm getting paranoid about the hay situation and I don't know how we are gonna keep these huge critter
s fed. I need Jesse to get well and get back on barn lootin' duty.

The sun is shining and that means Mick gets to take his turn on the backhoe. He's in the living room, pacing, while Rebecca and Rona make breakfast. I think they're making muffins because all the men are
ready to get to work and will probably want their breakfast to go.

Laundry is on the agenda for
today. Carisa will be excused from work, so I'll take her turn on laundry duty. We plan to have a little dance after supper to celebrate her birthday. Hisa says we can bring Jesse over from Clinic Diane but he'll have to stay on the couch. No slow-dancing for Carisa and Jesse, thank goodness.

Dane says he'll be in the meadow
, splitting logs and drilling holes. He and Jason plan to go out this afternoon and work on taking bolts from utility poles. They wanted to take Luke and Larson, but Rona almost smacked them in the head for even asking. She doesn't want the boys that far off the compound yet. She's a little paranoid about losing them again. I don't blame her.

Deuce wants to go to the meadow and finish getting the logs Kevin brought home dragged over to the fence area. I think he wants to ride Buttercup for a little while as well. We have the saddles we got from the prisoners
, but he prefers to ride bareback.

Jason rode one of the prisoner horses and said it was well trained and well behaved. Buttercup gets along with them.

I should stop calling them “prisoner horses” because they were victims along with the farmer to whom they belonged. They don't leave the meadow, even though there's no fence around it.

I guess I'm just partial to Buttercup since she saved Mick's life. She's getting fatter. I hope she's pregnant, and I hope she has an easy time delivering. Please Lord, don't make us have to pull a baby horse out of Buttercup!

I'm surprised the kids haven't named the other horses. Mick wants to name two of them “Peaches and Herb.” Maybe I’ll name the other one “Madonna.” Hey, it's not as bad as Pop naming the chickens “Larry, Moe, and Curly.”

Horses are also hay-eating machines. Pop said we need to be careful about how much we feed them because we don't want them to founder. Good Lord, we need hay! And lots of it, please!

I hear Rona bellowing that breakfast is ready. I hope Carisa gets out of bed soon. See ya later.

3:30 PM...

A lot happened.

Carisa was opening presents when Mr. Hobbs sounded the danger alarm.

At first, I was ticked off because something was interrupting Carisa's present-opening time. I quickly forgot about that when Mr. Hobbs added the words “There's five HDI's by the outhouse.”

Everyone ran for their weapons and Valerie herded the kids into the basement.

Mr. Hobbs was shooting HDI's when we stepped out on the por
ch. Mick yelled “They're comin' from the back.” I was relieved that no one had yet gone to the meadow.

Elaine started running for Clinic Diane because Jesse and Hisa were there alone. Dane had to pull her back when she almost ran smack dab into an HDI coming out of the trees along the path.

She raised her pistol, shot the HDI through the right eye, and continued down the path toward Clinic Diane and her son.

She made it about ten feet before a rotting hand and arm came out of the tree-line. Th
e hand grabbed her shooting arm and she quickly yanked it back towards her. She started screaming like a banshee. Her sudden jerk detached the rotten hand from its rotten arm and it fell at her feet.

A second arm came out of the tree-line, and it was attached to the rotting body of a
hungry, drooling HDI.

Dane was beside Elaine after two huge leaps. I swear,
he karate chopped the HDI's arm and it fell at Elaine's feet to keep company with the hand already there.

Dane shot the HDI point blank in the forehead. He and Elaine were both covered in a shower of thick, black goo. Elaine didn't even turn to thank him. She continued down the path. Dane watched her for a split second and then turned back to the battle.

Mick, Rona, and Kevin ran to the back porch with me. We left Rebecca, Mr. Hobbs, Jeremy, and Jason shooting HDI's who were making their way past the outhouse and into the front yard. Dane ran around to the front to help them. You should have seen him. He moved like a giant cowboy ninja.

Pop was trying to make his way to the motorhome for his rifle when an HDI came from the side and slammed into him. He fell to the ground and became tangled in the legs of the metal walker. The HDI was about to pounce on him, and I was about to take that suckers head off when I noticed that it was already taking bullets to the head.

I looked to my left and saw Carisa shooting with her .22 LR. I almost fainted. She was standing there with a tie-dyed skirt hanging around her neck, concentrating on making sure the HDI didn't get Pop. She killed it for good. It took four or five shots, but she put that sucker down.

Kevin ran into the yard and got Pop back on his feet. He practicall
y shoved Pop and Nana into the motorhome and was trying to get in there with them when an HDI grabbed his leg and began pulling him backwards.

He fell and slammed his face on the motorhome steps. He kicked the HDI in the face with his free foot and it stumbled back, letting go of his leg. He came up to his feet, raging like the incredible hulk, and used the palm of his hand to shove that HDI's “nose bone?” into
its brain. It dropped like a fly. He jumped inside the motorhome and slammed the door because two more HDI's were almost upon him. Obviously, Kevin has acquired a few ninja skills.