Under Construction

Sorry for only posting once yesterday, but we've been working hard trying to fortify the house. The windows are now covered with two layers of plywood, two by fours across them at one foot intervals, with heavy nails studded all over to make them stick. I beat on one for about five minutes as hard as I could, and didn't even bend it. Planning on bolting sheet metal to the outside of the house to cover the windows completely, but we're getting low on time.

The outbreak in Ohio has gotten worse. Cincinnati is a war zone, the national guard is mowing down anything that doesn't stop on command. It's nowhere near enough. Reports are coming in from all over the place that smaller outbreaks are occurring all over the Ohio valley. In ones and twos, people are bitten, and as they flee and die somewhere far away, the cycle starts again. The military is maintaining a tight quarantine on the bridges to northern Kentucky, but the damage has been done.

So far central Kentucky is safe. No reports that I have found, but it is only a matter of time before someplace with a decent population gets hit, like Lexington. Louisville will go soon too, and Frankfort, where I live, is the nut between the hammer and the anvil. But travel would be even more risky, so we're making a stand here.

Windows done, doors reinforced with wood and locks, bars across them and heavy backstops. We cut an escape hatch into the floor so we can get out through the crawlspace if needed, and knocked a few new holes in the foundation and put some doors on them. Patrick (my best friend) is going to stay with us, and probably check in on my mom for us a few times a day. He's in the crawlspace now, digging a hole to store things in, and we've even talked about making a tunnel, though I don't know how feasible that is.

Thank god it is getting to be spring, we won't have to worry about the wood burning stove for a while, and that's a modification we can do from inside the house. Cooking will be an issue once the power goes out, but the mod we made to the side deck should help out there.

We built up walls of plywood, eight feet high, topped with running boards that slant up and out to discourage climbers, and wrapped in barbed wire. the whole thing is banded with heavy planks, this thing is thick and strong. We will be cooking on the grill when we lose the ability to do it indoors.

The back yard is pretty well protected as it is. The chain link fence isn't high, but we have other yards on all sides, and it slopes away from the house, making it easy to see the whole thing. Over time we intend to build as high a fence as we can all around it, but we can live inside the house for a long, long time without going out there if needed.

The front deck is my next project. I plan to make it identical to the side, but with a few alterations. It will have a ladder to the roof, which we will eventually have platforms on, and another way into the house. The front will also house our only obvious entrance, which is going to be very, very heavily made. Maybe a walkway or two on the deck too, just to make firing weapons and keeping watch a little easier.

Oh, yeah. I have finally seen footage of zombies. Sort of a forgone conclusion, but I do feel some small relief that I'm not insane. It is getting worse. I only hope that we can make this place strong enough to last.

More tomorrow.