Post-Apocalypse Dead Letter Office Part 3

-Weixelman To: Ellen Biddle, North Kansas City, KS From: Gary Hoegaarden and Nancy Biddle, Santa Fe, NM July 20th, 20+5 Ellie- h.e.l.lo from Santa Fe. We hope things are going all right for you in KC, and wanted to let you know we'd be coming out your way pretty soon. And not to just visit. Thing have become so intolerable here that we can't stay, and so we're moving back east. We don't mean to sound pushy a" like we're coming out and just be ready whether you like it or not a" but we remembered the offer you made the other year, and are now hoping that it wasn't just an off-the-cuff nicety.

The water out of the Cochila Reservoir is dangerously close to being tapped out and water from snowmelt is simply not going to cut it for those of us left. Which reminds me that what few people remain here seem completely set on reverting to some kind of semi-savage lifestyle. Not like Native Americans "n.o.ble savagery" (yes, I know the term is bull, but you get the idea a" they had a civilization before white folk came over and hosed it all up for them. By the way, the indians on the rez west of town have apparently returned to their old, pre-Western ways and seem to be thriving), but seriously barbaric mob rule stuff. It's disturbing to us and dangerous here now, so early last year we made the decision to get the h.e.l.l out of this place and to somewhere just a touch more civilized. Honestly, we never considered Kansas City all that civilized, but we're willing to bet it's a far cry better than what Santa Fe has turned into. Just last week I scarcely escaped a beat down and probably far worse at the hands of roving thugs. I did take a good shot to my shoulder from a well slung rock, but came out of it none the worse for wear. A couple friends of ours, the Weirs a" we had drinks with them in the Railyard district one night when you were out visiting a" were not so lucky. They got caught making a run for water in early January and were killed. It's been hard living enough without idiots being violent, but the way things are now, it's time to leave.

Towards that end, we've been saving up food and other supplies for the extended road trip. Since last spring, we've been drying, pickling and otherwise preserving everything edible we can get our hands on. This has proven trickier than it sounds, as we never had much use for food preservation equipment and so never bought any.

But we've remedied that. I (Nance) have been picking through several old businesses and even some abandoned homes and homes where we know the previous tenants died for a" among other things a" serviceable jars, canning equipment, oven racks and door screens and other well-ventilated flat surfaces for drying food, etc. This may sound completely horribly ghoulish to you, maybe even like we're engaging in the barbarity we're trying to escape. I fundamentally agree, but we're just that desperate to get ourselves ahead of the game and out of town, and they're not using it.

If I may be so bold, Gary has turned into a d.a.m.n fine shot with the bow he acquired the second summer after everything fell apart. So, we've eaten mucho jackrabbit and put up a bit of deer and some p.r.o.nghorn jerky over the last year. It's nasty work, and difficult, getting the game back to the house once he's killed it, then dressing it and making jerky, but so much else has become a filthy toil since, you know. The deer jerky is pretty good, but the p.r.o.nghorn is so tough it tastes almost like a rawhide chew. Good to keep your mouth busy, I suppose.

It won't come as a surprise to you that most of our food preservation is done through drying. We've been putting most of it on the roof, where it's impossible for thugs to see it and steal it. Had to learn the hard way, though. Fortunately, the only thing they got away with was a bunch of ancho chilies. Hard telling if they even knew what they were stealing.

We'd been having trouble deciding what kind of bikes to take. Not bikes, really, but the junk we ought to put on the bikes to make the ride easier on us, what tires would be best suited to the job, etc. We figured fenders were pretty much unnecessary for a ride right now, but since we're still not ready to leave, that might change. We'll ask the courier when we see him next. Racks are simply a necessity, so we've scored a couple rear racks and finally located one to put on the front of my bike. I'm b.u.mmed about not being able to take my carbon frame bike. Gary told me it might be handy for running errands around town, but that I was freaking nuts to think he'd let me ride it fully loaded on a cross country trek. The roads are such a mess right now, and they're never going to get any better, I'm afraid. So, we finally decided to take a couple old school-style rigid steel frame mountain bikes. I'm fitting them out with drop bars and clips to increase our pedaling efficiency. Aluminum or even steel road bikes would have been both lighter and better for body positioning for long rides, but we think there's a trade-off with the wheels. We've had a terrible time trying to find tubes and tires for 700c presta valve based rims. Of course, 26 inch wheels, tubes and tires aren't growing on trees nowadays, but they're still easier to find than road stuff. Also, we think there's a distinct advantage in the durability and load capacity of 26 inch tires. (We really don't want to get stuck out in eastern Colorado or western Kansas with flat tires and at least 70 miles before the nearest place to get them checked out.) And inch and a halfs seem to be the best compromise between load capacity and rolling resistance. So, we've put got 26 x 1.5 inch semislick tires on each bike, with matching tubes, and a backup set of tubes and tires for each bike. With any luck we won't need any of the spares, but not having them is just an open invitation to trouble. We've maxed out the bottle cages on each bike, and Gary'll be strapping a three gallon water cooler to the rear rack of his bike. I'll have the tent packed into one of my pannier bags. We're splitting the food equally between us just for practicality's sake. Each of us will carry our own clothing, and so there won't be much of that. We'll bathe as much as possible and maybe find a way to do laundry once or twice during the trip, but chances are that we'll still be so incredibly ripe by the time we make it to eastern Kansas that you'll probably be able to smell us on the wind a day before we get into North KC. Oh, and we'll be wearing helmets, so rest a.s.sured there. I finally brought Gary around to my way of thinking a" that staying a bit cooler isn't worth getting a brain injury over. Besides, I told him his head would sunburn. (I was half-joking, but he is quite a bit thinner on top since you last saw him.) We both went round and round about this several times, but we've finally mapped out our trip. We estimate the the entire trip is 900 or so miles, maybe 1000 if we have to make serious detours or make sidetrips for more supplies. Our plan is to cover about fifty miles a day, sticking to riding in the early mornings and evenings to avoid as much as possible exerting ourselves in the heat. That's ambitious of us, but I think we can manage it. Here's our projected itinerary. We'll start out from here heading east, then north up I-25. The few couriers we've seen and talked to say the road is still in pretty good shape, which is great news to us. We'll ride I-25 north to Pueblo a" figure it'll take six days or maybe a week to get up there. We antic.i.p.ate this first leg as being the most difficult part of the trip, because a" while we're in decent shape and will be fresh and ready to ride a" our bikes will be most laden with food and water at this point, and we won't have gotten into real road-seasoned shape yet. Also, the hills between here and Pueblo are all pretty freakin' steep. You may think we should just take I-40 east through Texas and Oklahoma and then I-35 up north and northeast a" the way we always used to drive a" but there are a couple main reasons we're not going that way. We've heard Amarillo is now a haven for banditos, there appear to be fewer water sources that way a" at least on our maps a" and Pueblo will be a good pit stop before the next leg. Got a couple of really good friends up there who'll put us up for a night or two a" especially if we bring food! We've heard from the couriers that I-70 is in great shape, but water sources all through eastern Colorado and into western Kansas along that route are pretty slim. So, we think taking highway 50 east out of Pueblo and following the Arkansas river as long as possible is the best bet. We'll do that all the way past Dodge City, where the river turns northeast. We'll keep on east southeast towards Pratt, then into Wichita. This second leg is the longest, but we're hoping that since we're following the river downstream and have the wind at our backs it won't take much longer than the first, maybe eight days. Probably spend a night or two in Wichita, then take I-35 northeast into Kansas City. That'll be a bit hillier, but we figure five or six days, tops. Then we'll knock on your door and hope you have something for us to eat and maybe even a bottle of beer for us to share a" we're going to need it!

We're sending this ahead so you know to expect us a month or two from the time this letter is delivered. We're leaving in just over a month, and figure the letter might take a couple weeks to get to you, at the outside. These couriers are b.a.l.l.s out fast, and they're charging us quite a bit for delivery. (We gave them some p.r.o.nghorn jerky and told them it was deer, so the cost doesn't seem to hurt so bad.) Sorry this was so long. Didn't mean to bore you, just wanted to a.s.sure you that we'd really thought this thing through and had a decent, safe gameplan. We were just remembering the other day when heading over to visit you in Kansas City was a long day's drive. It seemed like such a pain in the a.s.s, then. Well, our a.s.ses are going to be about twenty times more sore after this trip! Wish us luck a" pray for us, even, if you think it'll help a" and we'll see you in October!

Gary and Nance To: Allen Lindsay, Jr., Lawrence, KS From: Virginia Lindsay, Wilsey, KS January 15th, 20+5 Dear Allen, Greetings from home. It's been so long since we've a" I've heard from you. But then, it's been so long since I've written you, too.

We've been lucky this winter. Except for a very brief cold snap at the beginning of the year, it's been so mild here. The wind still howls, and will only get worse in the coming months, of course. But the Halsey boys rode out early December and sealed up the leaks in the house's windows and doors. They even brought me half a cord of wood a" good hedge wood. Should see us a" me through the end of winter, anyway. Mrs. Halsey herself died just a couple months ago, a day or two after Thanksgiving. Flu. I don't know whether the Halsey boys were carrying it, or what it was particularly, but I came down with something nasty a few days after they worked on the house. Terrible sweats and chills. For three days I could scarcely find the strength to feed the fire and keep the stove going. Couldn't even get the lids off any of my canned goods. Wouldn't have done any good, anyway a" couldn't keep anything down but hamhock broth, and barely that. Oh, but I've been through worse. Sitting by the stove, listening to the wind (and being thankful that it was kept outside) and leafing through some old photo alb.u.ms was not a"

Anyway, Barb Halsey. You still remember her, don't you? She lived right in the middle of town, at 4th and Lyndon. The nice limestone house with the wrought iron gate. Taught you and Anne piano lessons. I know you were always a good student, Allen, but I think Anne skipped more than she went. Barb charged all the same, though. Ah, I can't hold that against her, such a minor thing now. She was a nice gal. I think a bit of her husband rubbed off on her, but she was still a basically good person. And her boys. Well, see above. They're both living in the house, now. Karl has a wife and a son and daughter a" chubby little towheads, so ornery a" and I think Marty has a pretty steady girlfriend.

I've been toying with the idea of moving over to Council Grove this spring. Just a few miles. I'm getting to the point where it's a little difficult to make it out to pump water several times a day. It'd just be so nice to have semi-running water again. They've set up or somehow re-fitted the windmills as pumps over there, and the reservoir and lake are still plenty full. Or so I've heard, anyway. Of course, a few of the more imaginative gossips in town (Meg Barnes, particularly) say that Kansas City has gaslights and trolleys now. But since Council Grove is pretty close I'm a bit more p.r.o.ne to believe about the windmills.

Woke up yesterday morning to the sound of the piano. It was the strangest thing. I bundled up and went downstairs and found one of the cats tramping all around the dining room. I'm not happy about them staying inside, but I guess it is winter and there's been coyote and even some cougar sightings. Not surprising, I suppose, what with the huge deer population explosion a couple years ago. I wouldn't want to be stuck outside, either. Of course, the tomcat disappears for days and even weeks on end. Haven't seen him for almost half a month now. It was the mama cat on the piano.

I still remember working in the kitchen and listening to the plinking and plunking coming from the dining room as you practiced. You rarely seemed to get exasperated with it, even though you inherited such short fingers from us. Don't think you ever went the entirety of your prescribed practice sessions, however. Either that, or the timer we used ran mighty fast.

Aside from the illness I had in December, I have been eating quite well. The summer harvest was fine a" plenty of tomatoes, beans and zucchini. The fall harvest, though. Well, I've never really seen the like, even when we had sprays and fertilizers, irrigation, etc. The corn alone took the whole town two weeks of sunup to sundown days to harvest. It's all drying, now a" most of it will get ground up in the spring for meal. What's left will go to hogs and the few cattle around here. Probably the cattle more than anything, as the hogs are pretty happy eating acorns. Vernon Mitch.e.l.l broke a forearm falling out of one of the apple trees a" a nearly-matured seedling a" while harvesting in his orchard and had to get ridden into Council Grove to get patched up by Doc Saw. (I can't say that the apples are all that tasty to eat out of hand, but there are a lot of them, and they make good juice and apple b.u.t.ter.) And, I've been eating on a half a hog since October! Nice as they are, I didn't trust the Halsey boys to slaughter it right. They're carpenters by trade. So, I had Art Muncy and his daughter Lill out to help slaughter, dress and cure it. They really did almost all the work. Art's a... well, kind of a layabout now. Grows marijuana and some not-so-great squash and pumpkins, but he used to work in Emporia at a meatpacking plant and knows his way around a carca.s.s. Never cared for him so much, but Lill's nice. Still cute, too a" sweetest smile a" and unattached. Just saying.

I sent them home with almost half the pig. I know what you'd say to that, but look a" just deal with it. Everyone a" everyone in this town, at least a" gets fed. Half a pig's a lot for one old lady, anyway, especially when you add it to the abundance of everything else. Have you been eating half as well as us?

(And anyway, Art grows superb weed.) I don't know, maybe it's just been so many years a" how many? five or six now? a" since we had such conveniences as pesticides and combines and the rail and satellite TV. I guess there was a lean year after everything went kaput, but we bounced back. We have so much here a" decent food and plenty of it, a roof, a stove, water a" that I can't say that I miss very many things anymore. Maybe just pineapple for upside down cake from time to time, and your father.

Have you heard from Anne lately? Last I knew she was up in Junction City. I really don't know what she's been up to for the past couple years. Going on three now. I mail her from time to time, but I'm not sure the new delivery service really knows what they're doing. They charge so much, too; it cost me two pounds of corn meal and a jar of crabapple jelly for just a 50 mile delivery, for one letter! Well, I guess the riders need it a" they're so skinny. (This is coming from Meg B of course, as the riders only hit the major junctions. But, after riding to and from town on that old Schwinn for these several years a" it's only a half a mile one-way a" I really will take her word for it this time.) If you hear from Anne, let me know please.

You know, I really do enjoy the quiet here, but it got to be a little too much last August and September, so I dug out the old RCA that belonged to your grandfather. Your father never listened to much music a" the radio was always tuned to market and weather reports. But he always had a soft spot for the Beach Boys, so I put them on the player and wound it up good. Endless Summer. The record played back just a little bit slow a" the spring or whatever makes it go is probably losing its shape, and it made Brian Wilson's voice a little huskier than I remember a" but it sounded fine to me.

All in all, though, I prefer piano.

With love, your mother Genny P.S. - Depending on when this arrives a" two weeks, three maybe? a" happy 37th birthday!

To: Gerald and Regina Olliver, Fort Riley, KS From: Donny and Fawn McCutcheon, Arkadelphia, AR August 26th, 20+4 Gerald (and Gina)- We received your letter a week ago today. Hope to hear better news from you soon. How is it possible that there was that big army post doesn't have any docs on it? Why'd it take so d.a.m.n long for the doc to get out to you from Junction City? Is Gina improved any? Is she conscious? Still delirious? Doesn't seem at all fair to be sick like that in summertime.

Glad to hear your sundry supplies are still holding out. This year's drought will be next year's bounty, we're praying for you. We looked at the map, and it shows that the base has a big old reservoir right north of it. Maybe you can make a trip to catch some fish out of it or a spillway when you fetch water, a.s.suming you have someone to keep an eye on Gina while you're out. Again, we're hoping and praying for you that the water will be enough to last you and everyone out there the summer through.

It hasn't been near what you been through, but life here has been up and down.

Firstly, we got ourselves a ghost train. n.o.body's sure how it started moving, but it came click-clacking right by our house into and out of town the week before last. Remember the sound that d.a.m.n thing used to make on the way past? It was a h.e.l.l of a shock to just see it rolling by without warning, almost completely quiet. Then, about a day later, it rolled right back through town and by our house. It made one last pa.s.s that evening and settled right in the middle of the bridge going over the Ouachita. Most folks think some kids must have found it and released the brakes on it as a prank, but Gina's uncle Harold, who used to work for Amtrak before he got busted for moonshining oh so long ago, says that the brakes' reservoirs depleted and then gravity took over and carried it downhill. A whole bunch of people clambered on top of it after it stopped and tried to scavenge food out of the dining car, but the folks who got stuck on the train must have raided it all before they ditched it. All the folks found the other day was wild yardbird nests.

You should see the flocks. Dozens, sometimes hundreds of them just covering hillsides. Scrawnier, more mean-spirited birds you have never laid eyes on. Course, it doesn't prevent foxes and bobcats from culling them a bit. Some folks, Fawn included, swear they've seen mountain lions loping through the thickets after them, too. Guess it's not outside the realm of possibility, but it seems a bit more work for a cougar to chase down a bony little feral chicken than a rangy but bigger, dumber, slower and meatier ranch cow back in the Texahoma or Kanorado areas.

Mad Tyson hens, most people call them. Heard a rumor that it was originally a small-time farmer what set a few flocks loose to feed on their own since there was no grain to be purchased. Of course, that puts the onus on a local boy and doesn't have nearly the same ring to it as does saying that Tyson cut the birds loose when it was obvious they were going out of business, just to spite everyone.

Speaking of the poultry operations around here, you can't even get within a quarter mile of the old processing plants without gagging on the odor. Once the power shut down, all them dead birds just sat there. Well, we heard they tried to get them into those big warehouse-sized freezers, in the dark, and maybe they did that. But those freezers only stay cold for so long without air conditioners pushing frigid air into them. An easy way to spot where a processing plant is/was is to look around for buzzards. They're thick as flies around those plants, just can't find a way to get inside. It'd be better for someone to actually let them in and clean the d.a.m.n places out, but you can't find someone dumb or crazy enough to go near one, and n.o.body knows whether the buzzards would even touch that stuff at this point.

The few birds we started keeping the other year have been well, and we've been able to keep the predators off them. Fawn has almost mastered the art of pickling eggs. Almost. When we cracked open the last batch to eat them, the sulfur smell almost made me run to the nearest processing plant to relieve my nose. We slept out on the porch that night, for certain. That batch got pitched out pretty d.a.m.n quick, but the rest have been good. Can't say I particularly care for the texture of the things, kind of like eating rubber erasers soaked in vinegar. But mash them up and add some hot mustard powder a" we get it from Greenville, MS a" and some bacon grease or oil and some chopped up dill pickles and they make a mean egg salad for sandwiches (when Fawn makes wheat bread). We'll eat the birds when they stop laying... and sometimes even if they haven't stopped. Roast them in the oven and eat them with cornbread.

I bartered a young nanny off one of our neighbors earlier this year. Evan McGroot a" when Gina comes to her senses, tell her that. Bet she'll laugh a" she know's Ev's history with goats. But I got this nan early spring for a half a jar of pickled eggs. Just half a jar! Well, I ought to have picked up on that as the first indication that something wasn't quite all even up with that animal. I brought it home and let it roam around the back half-acre. We're pretty well fenced in a" anything that can get through that fence is probably small enough to have trouble with a spiteful, full-grown nanny goat. So I let it roam, eat what it wanted, which was everything I didn't want it to eat. Rope, bark off the apple trees we planted from seedlings a couple years prior, and probably every other d.a.m.n thing that wasn't any good for it. Well, I'd originally got it to milk it and maybe make a little cheese (or have Fawn do it). That goat ate so d.a.m.n well it should have been producing at least a pint a day. Never got even a cup of milk, not one ounce. Finally I got so fed up we just slaughtered the d.a.m.n thing and roasted it on a spit, had a little party and invited everyone around. We invited Ev, but he never showed.

We're going to get a pig next year.

Sorry. Probably not real nice of me to go on about food right now, especially to you.

Things elsewhere in the state are about the same as last year, so we've heard. Little Rock has probably seen better days, but we don't know firsthand as we've never had need to go up there. Heard there was a bad fever outbreak up there in early February. Fawn and I have made a few trips up to Hot Springs, try to go at least once every couple months. We bathe regularly down at home, but Hot Springs is a special surprise I like to spring on Fawn. It's never busy as it used to be, but still gets plenty of visitors. So much nicer to sit in a hot bath without having to make a fire for it first.

Take care of Gina best you can, Gerald. We're happy she has a man like you around. Again, hope to hear better new from you soon. Write quick as you can.

All the best.

Don (and Fawn) P.S. - I'm writing this on a separate sheet of paper for a reason, Gerald. I want you to know that Tess a" Gina's mom you know a" died just a couple months ago. She caught the pox or fever or whatever it is that's wrecking Little Rock. Fawn and I supposed that it's better that, when Gina recovers and is well enough to read our letter to you both, it might be better to not include that information right away. If you feel differently, go ahead and give her this note, too. Otherwise, maybe it finds its way into a fire or a creek. Again, we're praying for Gina and you. Stay well. -D.

To: Thom Whitesall, Broadview Hotel, Wichita, KS From: d.i.c.k Wesley, Hotel Fort Des Moines, Des Moines, IA May 4th, 20+4 Tommy- Greetings from the Hotel Fort Des Moines.

I was thinking about you the other day. I really appreciated your support when I was working through my Hotel Management program and thought maybe I could return the favor with an idea. I can honestly say, though, that that program never really prepared me a" or probably you, for that matter a" for what happened the other year.

The year after the lights went off, we had a couple riots here in town: the big one at the capitol and a way smaller one a month or so prior. It wasn't even remotely a surprise. No electricity, no gasoline. It was a wonder to me that thousands more didn't die that winter. Well, of course, once the weather got hot in June, people started getting really p.i.s.sed off and it wasn't too long before they stormed the steps. I don't know what they expected to accomplish. Frustration's understandable. n.o.body could plant corn or soybeans a" en ma.s.se, anyway. Couldn't water them even if you did plant them. You couldn't get around without having to walk or ride a bike or, if you were really lucky, ride a horse. Couldn't take a s.h.i.t inside because the plumbing didn't work. Couldn't eat enough to make you have to s.h.i.t, anyway. Not like the state folks hadn't tried everything they could. What little news we got from DC, Minneapolis and elsewhere indicated that it wasn't just a Des Moines or an Iowa problem, but that it was everywhere. Now how is the state government going to fix things that the eggheads the feds have at their disposal can't even figure out?

Sorry, I just get irked about it. Frustrated at the frustration, even though I never was a real patient person. I guess I was more than a little peeved about life in general that summer, too. Since none of the guests could effectively leave town once everything stopped working, we turned into a kind of halfway house for them. I guess some did leave, and I hope they got where they were going. But most stayed at the hotel. Yeah, non-paying guests staying in your hotel while you can't really pay your workers. It was stressful, although quite a few of the guests are now pretty much working tenants. (Also, I can say that I'm glad the previous management never removed the fireplace out of the lobby. It's saved dozens of lives these last few years.) Well, so a couple hundred people stormed the capitol mid-day. It was the third week of June. June 18th, a Tuesday. And there was no one there to stop them. A couple weeks prior a smaller mob had taken over a Wal-Mart, carted off basically everything they could get away with and beaten the lone security guard there to within an inch of his life. So, there was a feeling that worse things were on the way. But the Guard, the Highway Patrol, sherriffs and police had no way to communicate with each other, no way to get around other than the options everyone else had. They didn't even have any bullets to fire had they known to be there AND been there when things got really out of hand at the capitol. And they did. A couple dozen congresspeople got pretty much hacked to pieces, ten raped beforehand, and then the idiots gutted the capitol building with fire. Twenty more died in the blaze.

Meanwhile, the mob just dissipated. n.o.body tried to stop them. n.o.body ever got called on it or brought to justice.

The Des Moines Disgrace.

The only fortunate thing about the whole mess was that the capitol building is pretty well isolated from other buildings nearby and so the fire didn't spread. The entire city could have gone up, what with no functional fire department. What was left of the government scrambled to get a hold of themselves, and reconvened outside City Hall a week later. By that time most everybody else had gotten completely fed up and there were almost three thousand people there. State, city and county law enforcement finally got somewhat organized and showed up, too, even though half of them were out of uniform. I was there, and the whole scene was hair-raising to me. The Congress took roll call, and called out each missing member twice. Once the roll had been taken, they got down to business. They met for all of thirty minutes, then dissolved. n.o.body really knew what was going on until the congresspeople started filtering into the crowd. Groups formed up around them, just pretty naturally. Everyone listened to what each member had to say. I wasn't there, but it all filtered down to me quick enough. The gist was that folks were told that the lights weren't coming back on, the sugar water wouldn't turn itself back into gasoline or diesel, the Wal-Marts weren't going to fill up again with cheap food and clothing, and that this sucked but, regardless, the outcome of the situation was ultimately up to them. Some folks thought they were being patronized and so they left, but the majority stuck around and started talking about how to improve things.

s.h.i.t, I've already rambled on too long about this. Here's the upshot. Folks got organized and started working instead of b.i.t.c.hing. All our park s.p.a.ce downtown and all along the river, for that matter, is now a community farm and orchard. The first year it was corn and soybeans, because that's all anyone really had seed for. But vegetable seeds made it around the next year, so the locals actually started raising something halfway tasty to eat.

We've gotten in on the act. There's a huge pool here at the hotel, but after the power went out we drained it as best we could to keep the whole thing from stagnating. Well I'd like to say that this was my idea, but the Emba.s.sy Suites thought of it first and we copped it from them. Anyway, the fire department set us up with a couple manual pumps. We seined what seemed like a few thousand hatchlings out of the river, pumped some fresh water into the pool and dumped them in, and started feeding them surplus corn. So we raise catfish. Channel cat. They seem to do best given the size limitations of the pool. I'd ask if you've ever eaten it, but you grew up in Missouri, so you had to have, right? I was never really a big fan of it a" muddy tasting a" but now it's on my dinner table at least twice a week. So, I've gotten pretty used to it. We use what we don't eat to barter for firewood, filtered water, veggies, etc. Don't know how things are down in Wichita, but I thought you might like to know that this is being done and maybe give it a shot.

It's difficult work, and the whole place can get pretty d.a.m.ned smelly. Fortunately, the pool area doors seal well. The main thing, aside from feeding and harvesting the fish, is keeping the pumps active to get the waste out and fresh water in. It's a pain, and it's dirty. But it's a job everyone does every now and then. Even me. I'm just thankful that the tenants are pitching in.

Life is still hard here. We had another bad winter two years ago. My daughter, Eileen, died of the flu that January. Things got so bad between my wife and I after that, so pointless everything seemed, that sometimes I wished the whole town... Sorry. There's not much else to say except that I hope you and yours are well. Take care.

- d.i.c.k Wesley P.S. - Almost forgot. Congress moved back into the capitol building later that year, but they're still renovating the building even today. I don't know if you ever made it up to Des Moines, but the capitol building was a beaut, with a shiny gold-hued dome atop it. Now the dome's tarnished. It's been left that way. For the best, I think.

To: The Maxwell Family, Warrensburg, MO From: Roger and Megan d.i.c.kson, Wenatchee, WA March 31, 20+4 Dear Jeff, h.e.l.lo from the big W.

The three sisters garden/farm idea didn't take off last year as we'd hoped. The beans and peas did pretty well a" you may never have liked them, but we ate a ton of edamame last summer and had a whole bunch of beans and split peas dried for using over the winter. They turned out to be our saving grace. The corn didn't do so hot a" maybe we hadn't planted it in the right way, or too far away from the other two to benefit from the root nutrient interactions. Roger thinks that, whatever the other problems, we overplanted the corn, and he's very probably right about that. The squash almost all c.r.a.pped out on us. We think there was some kind of parasite, but without any real way to properly test things we'll just have to wonder. We're pretty sure it wasn't fungal, as you can see and readily identify that. Anyway, we saved the seeds of those few squash that did live through the summer and torched the fields and brush last fall, hoping that fire would get rid of whatever the problem was. Dirty work.

So yeah, last winter was pretty lean. We had split pea soup pretty much every day from late November through mid-March. It's good stuff, and we were able to mooch / trade beans for some beef and ham bones and bacon from various neighbors to give it a little more richness. But four months of one type of soup accompanied by some cornbread is more than a little monotonous. Guess I shouldn't b.i.t.c.h a" others elsewhere have been through so much worse. We did have a nice crop of apples from the trees surrounding the house, too a" but don't we always? a" so there was a bit of sweetness to be had. The Jonathans turned out especially well, this year, and we ate them quick as we could a" they don't keep for anything, but we'd learned that long long ago. Cider, too! Our "neighborhood" had a big community pressing and we came away with almost ten gallons of the stuff. Fermented virtually all of it, because, man, it's nice to have that keeping you warm through the cold months.

I guess, in light of the fact that we had cider, things weren't too bad at all. We holed up in early December. Roger had laid up a good supply of wood, played banjo and tinkered with the bikes and I cooked the soup and baked and mended clothes and fumbled around on the piano. And we both slept a lot, and tripped out a bit (but I'll get to that). The weather was cold, but not overly so. Less snow than usual, but other than that, a pretty typical winter.

We haven't given up on the three sisters farm idea, though. We're hoping the plants that grow from the seeds we saved will also have some resistance to whatever the problem was. Roger's been hanging out with some of the older farmers at the co-op, drinking some horrible coffee mixed with dandelion roots and talking shop. He got some ideas about rejiggering the size of the crop cl.u.s.ters, so hopefully our yield will improve this year.

Here's some of the best news, one of the things I really wanted to write to you about. We've got morels! YEE HAW! I'd really like to say we planned it, but you know the deal with morels. There's just no telling when or where they're going to show up. Well, so we were out surveying things just a couple weeks ago, trying to plot where each crop cl.u.s.ter would go. I was sketching the layout of the field, s.p.a.cing and such, when I heard Roger start cackling. Well, you know Roger's quick to laugh, so I didn't make much of it. But he walked around behind me, held my head between his hands and shifted my gaze up. I'd never seen so many morels in one place. It was the mother lode.

We knew we'd never be able to gather them all, so we biked all around to the different farms quick as we could and rounded people up. We had seven families come out to help with the picking. All told, we brought in over 250 pounds of morels! (We left quite a few in the field, in the hopes that they'll come back next year.) We took the lion's share, of course, but everyone else left more than satisfied with a couple dozen pounds of mushrooms to each family. We probably could have kept more and still had people go away happy, but those other folks had been so decent to us over the winter it felt like we should return the favor.

So now we're up to our eyeb.a.l.l.s in morels. Roger has set up a few old, salvaged screen windows and is trying to dry most of them that way. I've been breading them in corn meal and a little salt and pepper and frying them in leftover bacon fat. Good G.o.d, they're just amazing. Roger almost ate himself sick on them the other day. We've even been adding them to our soup a" they make it a lot better, but I feel like the mushrooms should be on their own.

We're reasonably certain it was last fall's burn off that sprung them. I've been reading up a bit on them lately and a good scorching seems to be a fairly common precursor to a big fruiting. I don't think we ought to burn again this fall a" I'm afraid we might damage the mycelia. But, we're encouraging all our other neighbors to burn, staggering them year to year. It's doubtful we'll get mother lode type fruitings, but hopefully we can get decent ones regularly, as heading out to pick wild morels is such a pain in the a.s.s. (Not nearly as dangerous as it used to be, though.) We've also been gathering and using some psychedelics. As the squash failed last year, I took to helping out at Rob and Heather Montgomery's farm. There's not a whole lot one can do when a crop just sputters like that, so I figured I'd make myself productive. By mid-November, after all our harvest tasks had been accomplished, I was working almost full time out there. Feeding and watering the cattle, general maintenance, stuff like that. (Built up some goodwill for us, which made mooching bones and a little bit of meat from them over the winter that much easier.) Anyway, I was out in their pasture to load up the cow patties. Most of them that I saw had cl.u.s.ters of little brown mushrooms poking up out of them. I picked them out and kept them separate from the dung, and asked Rob whether I could keep them. He eyed me for a few seconds, then laughed and said to just be careful, as he knew for a fact that they were pretty potent. Ended up with almost two pounds of them, dry weight! I took a few ounces back to Rob; he was happy to have them. And he was right, they're phenomenal. It made me want to tie dye things again, but without a good source of dye we're probably out of luck. They're psilocybe cubensis, according to the couple guides we consulted (and we did consult them before consuming the shrooms).

We tripped on them once in early January, and Roger went off on how civilization had fundamentally changed in the last four years. That we'd become like mushrooms themselves a" growing out of the old, dead civilization. Of course, it was stoned rambling, but he was sincere about it afterwards like he'd glimpsed something really basic about the world.

I have to say that I disagree with him. You and I both know that most mushrooms are saprophytes a" years and years of hunting morels with grandma was a pretty good education fungus-wise a" but that is emphatically not what this culture of ours is now. In fact, I'd argue that, as a cultural organism, we've shifted from being saprophytic to being somehow mycorrhizal or almost truly photosynthetic. For example, think about all the ways in which pop culture and fashion used to simply regenerate itself out of stuff that had fallen out of favor a decade or so prior a" I have bell bottoms from both the 70s, early 90s and early 00s as evidence. Things now are so totally punk, not as in s.h.i.tty music, but as in forging your own way and the do-it-yourself ethic. I guess there were always streaks of that originality in culture prior to everything going dark, but it was all so overshadowed by catty, horrible people trying to sell others on the repackaged, rehashed, rewarmed versions of that original stuff. The irony is almost all gone now, and to be honest, we really like it that way. I guess I just muddled everything here, but of course, neither Roger and me are real biologists a" naturalists, yes, but not trained scientists a" or cultural critics, so please don't hold us too accountable for the real appropriateness of the metaphor.

Finally, and this is the other main reason I'm writing you a" other than the fact that I love you and want to keep you informed of the general state of affairs around here a" we're pregnant. Well, I am. Hee hee. The long winter, coupled with the fairly meager harvest and relatively plentiful intoxicants meant lots of cuddling was virtually a necessity. Probably too much information for you, but there it is. So yeah, it's underway. We're excited, eager, gut-bustingly nervous and all sorts of other emotions all at once right now. Doc says I'm about two months along, so you can expect to be an uncle in late November or early December.

I know you're worried about the risks we're taking with this. We know, and we know they're even greater than the last time we tried. But we're at a point now where we feel that we can chance this again. Hope springs eternal, right? If not, well, at least we've got mushrooms to put in the soup.

Hope you, Pat and little Jeff and Joan weathered the winter well. Best wishes to all of you for a happy, peaceful and productive year.

Love, Roger and Megan P.S. - The spore print here is taken from one of the cubies I gathered last fall. Chances are very good that the spores are viable. Just tear off the print, slip it in a well-watered compost or s.h.i.t pile and I bet you'll get a decent crop this fall. (Wash them off before you eat them, of course.) Have fun.

To: Jill Bielefeld, Emporia, KS From: Kyle Oort, Neenah, WI Jill- I had my hopes for the opposite, but all the same I antic.i.p.ated you would respond the way you did. And it's true that sometimes I leap head first into things that probably could use a bit more thinking through. As you said, it just comes naturally because "we are who we are." (Not just quoting you here but including the originals to show I really am reading what you wrote!) "Getting stoned and/or drunk off our collective a.s.ses after work and dinner, almost every night it seemed, only to get up at the b.u.t.tcrack of dawn and work another ten hours the next day." You can do that here. There's been such upheaval with regards to the drug culture that n.o.body even cares whether you grow it, smoke it, whatever. I've got a couple plants in back with my little garden, but buy most of it from a dude I knew from high school. h.e.l.l of a nice guy. Oh sure, we'd have Stella to take care of, but she'd have friends to play with around here. There are quite a few children in the neighborhood, including that aforementioned dude's. He's got a daughter and a son a" rambunctious, too, just like Stella sounds. And I've got plenty of room now that dad has pa.s.sed on, G.o.d rest him. It's been confusing to me lately, what to do, what to do with all this s.p.a.ce, but it really would be perfect for you and your daughter. Even got a new solar heater installed last year, so it gets plenty warm during the day even if there is no firewood. But there is!

Speaking of which, "What could you do to support not just yourself, but Stella and me as well?" Point well taken, but after some thinking I know that yes I ABSOLUTELY CAN support you both. I've figured it out, how to fit into the Double-Star-and-Bar operation. So, it's a ranch, right? Bunch of cows. Well, "Remember the number of majors you had as an undergrad? I do: four." Now, remember what one of those majors was? Dairy science. I'll readily admit that it only lasted a semester, but I picked up sooo much I know that I can make a big impact in the variety of the products the ranch can offer to its customers! There's really not all that much to it, if I remember correctly. Feed the cattle, milk them and add rennet and salt a" which, hey, plenty of cows means you'll have plenty of rennet available. Put it into molds, then, a few weeks later you've got cheese!

Again, the option is yours. If you decide you want to come up this-a-way, just let me know soonest. I know a trip up this fall would be virtually out of the question, but if you wait just a season or so, I can save up a bit and send it down to you to fund your exodus. After all, "It's really intolerable here." Alternatively, if it's still "such an unconscionably large risk" that you can't take, I think I've adequately stated my ability to help you make ends meet down on the ranch.

With high hopes!

Kyle P.S. - Yes, I re-used the letter you sent, but only because we're still working on steam operation for the mills. Progress has been slow, and they may have to cut our staff further if there are further c.o.c.k-ups (pardon) and/or delays, but I think things will work out.

Previous letter Dear Kyle, So good to hear from you the other week. I must say that I was a bit surprised by what you proposed. Let me start by telling you that I'm remarkably flattered you feel this way, and that you are a wonderful man and will be a wonderful husband to someone. But, difficult as it is for me to do this, I must decline your offer. I hope to make clear why in this letter.

First and foremost, I was so sorry to hear your father pa.s.sed away. I remember meeting him that first summer after we met.

Now, to the heart of the matter, and I'm sorry if this is hard for you to read a" and it's harder for me to write than you can imagine a" I feel that you are p.r.o.ne to snap judgment and sometimes really rash decision-making. Granted, you kept yourself to the biological sciences a" more or less a" but still, you did a lot of jumping around. I remember being so glad you settled on forestry. Summers on the Superior NF's trail crew. Man, what times. Out for days, maybe weeks on end at spike camps. Not showering for days and days a" remember when that used to be fun. Now not bathing, much less showering, is just a way of life (around here, anyway a" no doubt you have better access to water up there).

More to the point, I'm not sure you've thought this whole thing through. How would you get down here? I know Neenah might be a bit lonely a" especially in the winter a" but you still work for Georgia-Pacific, or whatever it is now, right? However you've managed to hold on to that job, you'd better keep on doing it. Cling to it, because there isn't anything better down this way. (And, needless to say, there are no forests down this way, no good work for you despite your experience and education.) I've mentioned this before, but Emporia still smells like Satan's a.s.shole... pardon my language. After six plus years, you'd think all that stuff would have finally been converted to whatever it turns into, you know... found some kind of state where it can't decompose any further. Maybe that's the case, in fact, but the odor still permeates the entire city. Have to get a few miles out of town a" to the west a" to catch a whiff of any real fresh air. The whole area around the railyard and packing plants are simply deserted, you can't even get close to them without retching. Paper mills might have smelled a touch worse than the slaughterhouses before, but I'll bet they're like a spring bouquet in comparison these days. Especially now, at the height of summer. And we're accustomed to it out here a" as habituated as you can get to the smell of tons of rotting meat, anyway. I don't mean this to be discouraging to you, but it's just a statement of fact that the whole town smells real bad.

They've reconst.i.tuted a bit of the ranching out here, from some of the cows that weren't killed before the lights went out. I was really lucky to get on as one of the tutors at the Double-Star-and-Bar ranch, which has been doing about as good as any of the others. I kind of had an in with them, as Stella's father is the son of the owner of the ranch. Hadn't filled you in on that previously. Never meant to mislead you at all about anything. I'd known him forever, it seems, from before college. We're not together in any real sense of the word. The desperation I felt after the lights went out and I couldn't get out of town again... it was a mistake I'd not repeat given a second chance... I don't want to revisit it in my mind more than necessary.

Regardless, the upshot is that they can't really fire me without there being a big stink a" haha! a" and I can raise Stella and tutor her along with the other kids at the ranch, so she'll get a modic.u.m of an education. At the same time, I'm pretty much tied to the ranch. They put me and Stella up, feed us and make sure we've at least got clothes and a couple creature comforts. Their fortunes are my fortune, now, for better or worse. And, there's been real serious talk of the ranch moving to an entirely different city. Moving the whole d.a.m.n operation so it'll be closer to a reliable source of water. Martin and his father have had scouts out looking for good routes on which to move a herd, but no one's told me where to, of course. Might be up to Council Grove, might be to Burlington, or even further afield. Just can't say where we'll be MOVING ON to.

As for the suggestion of Stella and I moving up to Neenah, well I just can't entertain the thought of it. I have a fair idea of where you're located, but no reliable transportation, much less any money or goods with which to barter our way up north. And even if we were able to and did get there, what if you and she a" h.e.l.l, you and me, for that matter a" don't get along? She's a... lively and strong-willed child. Not her fault, really, just the situation she's in and the fact that her father and I... well, that . And the winters up there. I know you're connected with a good source of firewood, but the climate would be such a change from what we're used to...

It's just . It's one I can't take. I just can't.

I really and truly don't mean to sound hostile towards you. We've always been close, and I'm fond of you a" all the fun we had at Carleton, reading your letters and writing back. It's just that... I feel like I need to reiterate these things, as you sometimes seem to not listen (or read) as closely as you ought. Regardless, do write back please, and soon. Again, I enjoy corresponding with you, reminiscing about the "good old days" and learning of your latest adventures up in Wisconsin.

Best wishes, Kyle. Take care of yourself.

Your friend, Jill Bielefeld To: Martha Klundt, Lindsborg, KS From: Rod Doornan, Eau Claire, WI February 4th, 20+4 Dear Martha and Kids, h.e.l.lo from Wisconsin!

I'm writing this right now so I have it ready to go first thing when the courier shows up, which will probably be mid-March. There hasn't been all that much to do for the better part of four months except sleep, cook, eat, sit by the fire and nap or read, and occasionally venture outside to sc.r.a.pe off the solar heater windows, snag more wood for the stove and scoop up some snow for making water. Well, OK, all that does take up quite a bit of time, but I made a d.a.m.n big batch of stew earlier this week and have been eating it straight out of the pot for the past three days, and not cooking has freed things up. Haven't made such good stew in a long time. I'm proud of it, actually, and have attached the recipe for you. See, when it comes right down to it we men can take good care of ourselves.

And d.a.m.n, yeah, those forays outside have been more and more occasional as the winter has progressed. It has just been so cold lately. It's been a slightly above-average year, snow-wise, and there hasn't been even one warmish streak since mid-November. So everything's just piled up outside. So quiet now that you wouldn't believe it. It's to the point that I don't even look at the thermometer on the kitchen window when I get up in the morning. I know that little red k.n.o.b will still be stuck at the bottom.

I know I haven't written you for a while, but I've had reason. The Chippewa flooded last May, took almost half the town with it. Most fortunate was the fact that only a handful of people around Eau Claire drowned a" maybe half a dozen. But it almost ruined the mill we'd just finished building the summer prior. It had been in operation for all of nine months. Sure saw some use in that time, especially the other fall. One of the milliners swore he saw smoke coming off of it after a few really intense days in early September. The good thing is that the millstone didn't get washed downstream, and the basic structure was still more or less intact. Just needed to clean it all up really good, replace the few lost parts a" the water wheel, mainly a" and wooden parts and get the mechanisms pieced back together and put into in running condition again. Easier said than done, of course a" it took about a half-dozen of us all summer and then a bit into fall to get it all back into working order. What with all the rain that spring there was a h.e.l.l of a good crop to process, and most of it got put through in good order (before the mice got all of it). Bad part of it was that we weren't able to get any beer down for the Octoberfest this year. Yeah, we still celebrate it a" how else are we going to get our rocks off before everything freezes shut up here? Well, we did have plenty of cranberry/maple brandy, so it wasn't a total loss. I didn't feel much like drinking last fall, anyway. I sure hope we have a decent crop this coming year to feed into the mill. (And that it doesn't flood here again!) Haven't heard back from Vernie, have you? I still, for the life of me, can't imagine why he'd just up and leave like that. Not that I don't take you at your word. And, for the record, he's not my brother any longer. I have had no indication that he would do so, but if he shows up here, he'll get turned away. Forget how cold it is, he'll not be allowed in this house. If he comes back to you, then and only then will I welcome him back as a brother. Until that point, he is persona non grata up in my neck of the woods. (Yes, persona non grata. All this winter reading is paying off in the vocabulary department.) Along the same lines, Barb left. In hindsight, it had been a long time coming. She was none too happy when we moved out here from St. Paul, but eventually got used to it. Then, you know, everything stopped working and she couldn't get her medications and just got really unstable. I told you all about that before, I don't want to talk about it again. But last spring, when the rain was so bad and the river was rising, things got real bad again. I tried to calm her down, told her more times than I can remember that we personally were safe a" living so far uphill and to the east of the river a" but she wouldn't listen. Once we got word that the Chippewa crested its banks she lost it and took some cabbages some beef jerky and cheese and a bottle of brandy and climbed into the attic. She slammed the door behind her and slid something heavy on top of it a" I think that old day bed. I didn't want to get things to get violent again, so I just went out and tried to find Dr. Carter. Well, he was busy with other hard cases, but he said he thought that some St. John's Wort might help her out. That was all he could recommend, and I didn't want to take up his time any further. So, I picked up a tincture of the stuff from the local "alternative apothecary".

When I got home late afternoon, Barb was outside, sitting in that little rowboat we own and holding an umbrella. She said she was going to wait there for forty days and nights, just to be certain, and that I had to bring her food and brandy every day. Well, so again, I didn't want to cross her because I knew that if I tried to coax her inside or argue that one of us would have gotten hurt for certain, so I went inside and slept by myself. The next day she was chanting "39 days, 39 nights" over and over when I went out to talk to her. I went back inside and fixed a little bit of breakfast for her: an egg on toast and a little pinky gla.s.sful of apple brandy. (Brandy is/was all Barb would drink when in an episode, and so I mixed a few drops of the St. John's Wort tincture in with her aperitif.) She ate her whole breakfast in maybe four bites, and drank her brandy in one fell swoop. I took everything back inside and waited. This all repeated itself every meal for a couple days. Then, she came into the house mid-afternoon and said she wanted a bath. So, I heated up some water on the stove and gave her a decent pan bath and she let me put her to bed afterwards.

I had hoped that I could keep dosing her with brandy and St. John's Wort. But a couple days after I thought I got her stabilized, I had to go help survey the damage to the mill. When I got back to the house, I found the front door open. Half the cheeses and all the beef jerky in the pantry were gone, and Barb's bicycle wasn't in the garage. There was a little note in the kitchen that read, "36 days left, going to Pike's Peak so I won't drown. You can come, too. Bring rest of cheese and another bottle of brandy."

I looked at a map and guessed which road she'd be most likely to take, and bolted down it to try and catch up with her. Violence or no, I'd catch up and bring her back. But I hadn't caught her by the time I reached Menomonie, and it was so late by the time I got there, I had to spend the night in a barn. I asked the exceedingly friendly farmer whose barn I crashed in to keep his eye open for a woman meeting Barb's description and to spread the word then took off back towards Eau Claire at first light the next day, stopped at home just in case she'd found her way back, then zipped southeast towards Fairchild. I didn't see her at all by the time I'd reached Fairchild so I had a quick lunch and asked the local authorities to please remain on the lookout for Barb, then I rode through Osseo on the way home and did the same thing. And I didn't sleep that night or at all, I guess, for a week or so. It was the worst... it was bad. I still can't think of where she might have gone, what might have happened to her. The local sheriff had his deputies on the lookout all summer for any indication of where she'd been, but they never found any sign. He suggested a couple things that might have happened to her, but I can't bring myself to mention them now. I kept riding all over Eau Claire and Chippewa counties trying to locate her, but found nothing, either.

The worst was I rode over to Cadott one day and didn't find her or get any news of her from anyone there. On the way back I saw a little trail heading off the road. I was pretty much out of my head at that point, so I thought there was a chance Barb had gone off in there and so I followed the trail into a thick tract of woods. After about 15 minutes of slow riding along this track the trail ended abruptly and there, right there was a huge airplane wreck, an honest to G.o.d 747 or whatever strewn all through the woods. I'd never heard anything through the grapevine about there being a plane crash out here, it was a saddening sight. Most of it had broken up, just disintegrated, but there were still a few sections intact. It must have crashed when everything went dark, it seems like forever ago. I stood looking at it for probably five or ten minutes. Remember wondering if things this big skip, like a flat rock on a pond. I suppose so, because the tail section had flipped over and into what looked like the center of the wreck. It smelled really disgusting, like melted plastic fused with metal and bodies. I was walking a little more around the perimeter of the whole carca.s.s when I heard something shuffling around. All of a sudden a black bear waddled out from behind a bunch of bushes. It looked at me in surprise for a few seconds then lowered its head and started charging. I'm pretty certain now that it was a sow, and it probably just had cubs in the area and was protecting them. Something to be said for that, but at the time I was scared. And, s.h.i.t, you know I don't move all that well, but like I said I was out of sorts and just forgot all the things you're supposed to do in that situation so I started running in the opposite direction, toward the tail section. I ran past the few seats, occupied by buckled-in and decayed bodies, to the restrooms. The door to one of them was open and I darted inside it, slammed it shut and locked the door. The bear hit the door about five seconds later, growling and pawing. It was pitch black in the restroom, cramped and hot. The body and plastic smell was even worse, but I didn't dare open the door back up. I don't even remember how long it was before the bear went away, but by the time I was sure it was gone and opened the door it was pitch black outside. I was disoriented from the shock of seeing the wreck and bear and from the chase, so I decided to sleep there in the restroom for the night. But I could hardly fall sleep, knowing there were bodies right outside the door. Who were they? Their families can't possibly know what happened to them, like I may never know what... I opened the door the next morning and sunlight flooded in. This helped me get my bearings, as the open end of the tail section was clearly facing east. I peeked out the opening and listened for about five minutes before deciding the coast was clear. Before I left, and I know this is horrible and I still feel bad about it, I rooted through the little kitchen area and took all the bags of pretzels and chips and cans of soda that I could load onto my bike.

So, I a" Obviously, fall and winter have been difficult for me. But in addition to the reading and keeping up shop, I've tried to keep busy planning new solar heater set ups. So busy I was last spring and summer with fixing up the mill and trying to both keep my mind off what might have happened to Barb and find her that I wasn't able to continue on with the solar heater business. But I had to prioritize, and the fact that most folks around here are able to put up plenty of wood for winter made the solar heater thing less a pressing issue than having good flour and cracked brewing grain for everyone. I fully expect to get back into the swing of things this April or May, once it warms up a bit. Year before last they were in demand, and I don't think that will have lessened any, what with the bitterness of the weather right now.

I've included some design sketches for you. They're not blueprints, as such, but they should be enough information to get you underway if you wanted to make one for yourself. The d.a.m.n things are so simple that chances are you could put together a pretty decent one with just the information here. But, I know there was a good article about these in Mother Earth News several years ago. If you can dig one up at the library, it'd probably help immensely.

So, regardless of what happened last year, I wish you a Happy (and hopefully not belated) Easter! I hope you all had a great pa.s.sion play, if you're still doing that. Tell Marty, Yasmin and Betty their uncle says h.e.l.lo, and that they don't have to share this cheese with their friends if they don't want to. (It's too a-Gouda for that!) Also, I've packed in a few of those sodas and chips for them a" they're too young to remember what Pepsi tastes like, and I wanted them to have a chance to try it. Just don't tell them where it's from.

ROD.

Rod's stew Four cups pearled barley Two pounds fatty beef (or pork or whatever, just make sure it has a bone in it) Three turnips Three carrots Two onions Three or four cloves of garlic 2 tablespoons of salt if you have it Plenty of black pepper if you can find some One gallon or so of water Bring the water to boil on top of stove and add barley, meat (cubed up best you can) and bone (if it's whole, crack it open to expose the marrow) and boil for a few minutes. Move the pot to the edge of the stove and simmer it for an hour or two, then add the rest of the ingredients, all sliced up thin as you can do it, and bring it back to a boil for another few minutes. Then let it simmer for another hour or as long as you can stand smelling it before breaking down. You can remove the bone at th