Aug. 28, 2009 - 12:36pm

The strong survive.

- Transmission from miken40

Drak, what a huge relief to hear that others are dealing ok with all this. I’m in our cabin up in the Poconos with the wife and kids and we were caught completely off guard. First some reports on the radio, then we lost power, now nothing. We’re isolated up here so charged my Blackberry off the dynamo flashlight in the cabin and I took a chance hiking further down toward town to see if I could get a signal. I’m glad I found your blog ‘cause news on the web is either old or spotty and I don’t know what to believe. So far we haven’t seen any of “them” but I feel pretty good about our short term security because I brought along my 12 gauge to do some shooting. Now I’m conserving shells though because I may need it to hunt or fight. We were only supposed to be up here for a week so we only have a week’s worth of food, maybe more if we conserve. Water’s fine for now. Not sure what to do. Do we stay put or make a try for home? Starve here or risk running into “them” closer to civilization. We haven’t told the kids yet what’s going on. Why freak them out. I’ll try to stay in touch but the hike to a cell signal is about three or four miles and I don’t know if the signal will be here next time I come. If you have any advice, please post it here. Good luck.

- End of Transmission

Batteries are dangerously low. I used the last of the gas filling the generator. I have an idea on where I might find some fuel too keep the lights on.

I will reply to you all, I promise.

Aug. 28, 2009 - 12:36pm

- Transmission from Ren

Drackinclaw… thanks for chatting with me the other night, Ill look for a Ham radio so maybe we can talk. I gotta say…..your neighborhood looks terrible! We are no where near that bad of shape, but im not close to any major cities either. Do you think those fires are being set on purpose, or a by product of fighting of some kind? Also how is your generator holding out? Im worried about running mine too much because of the noise in attracting “them” or other “guests”. I think I will try and scavenge some 12 volt batteries like maybe 6 or 7 and just top them off now and again. That way I can at least have some lights and keep my little 12 volt cooler/fridge running, and it would be a lot quieter.

As far as me having to leave the chat so abruptly yesterday…. Ive heard of the term, “F$#@ me running in the rain”. I guess now it brings on a whole new meaning. It was raining so hard I couldn’t tell who or what was chasing….. I will guess, and say a woman, because I couldn’t clearly see down the street, it was coming down so damn heavy I couldn’t really tell what was going on… but by the time I was able to get out to help they were already out of sight. So I don’t know if “they” got her or not. It sucks that I couldn’t help fast enough. My leg got wrenched in the “accident”, if you could call it that, trying to get home a few days ago. My heads also got a severe gash in it, so my wife has now given me a buzz cut so we can keep an eye on it. All those years of sitting behind a desk has taken its toll too. Im really, really feeling out of shape, and it almost cost me my life getting home… but Ill go more into that later. Its time for me to check on the flooding situation…. Its still pouring out. Hang in there all of you, and watch your six.

- End of Transmission

Aug. 28, 2009 - 12:06pm

OK. There it is. Christ, this LED headlamp I bought has proven to be
priceless to us.

My Fathers radio is an old Collins KWM-380. This thing is built like
a tank and weighs almost 50 pounds. He had it all set up for Field
Day with a couple of 12V leads and battery clamps.

I hauled the old beast upstairs. To power it, I pulled the battery
from the new Toro riding lawn mower in the garage. Somehow, I not real
worried about the lawn right now and I'd rather not run the generator anymore than
absolutely necessary.

I grabbed about 6 feet of old lamp cord and inserted it into the
antenna jack on the back of the radio. Not good for transmitting,
but it is OK for receiving if I remember correctly.

When I powered up the old rig. I was greeted by the familiar glow
of the display. I cannot describe the feeling of freedom we had.
It meant a possible new form of communication. REAL TIME God 
miss cell phones.

So I tuned around a little to see if the BBC was out there. Hell,
I'd would have even settled for one of those religious stations
right then.

I got Nothing.

Guess most of these stations have moved on to satellite or
internet radio or something.

Then I thought about the HAM bands. There's gotta be somebody
out there flapping their jaw about what's going on.

Weird. There was nothing but some kind of odd warbling noise.
Even if someone were talking, I couldn't hear shit over that.

Ah well, it was worth a try. I guess this old radio really is
shot after all. May as well quit farting around and get back
to reality.

Suddenly, I heard something. It is faint and I almost missed it.

I tuned the dial to better pick up the faint station I was
hearing on 11.545 Megahertz.

Listen.

Aug. 28, 2009 - 7:43am

Still no contact with the family. The wife's or mine. Iv reached out in every way possible or at least every medium that still functions. Which is fundamentally just the net. Could they be in a worse situation than I am?

I'm very worried.

• water is being consumed faster than expected
• Nearly almost out of gasoline