Quarantine Diaries. Or, There Is Considerably Less Mad Max Style Vehicle Combat Going On Than I Was Led To Believe Would Occur.

  Quarantine Diary, Day 79



  Everyone has an idealized vision of themselves. A version of them that they know they could be if they just had the drive and commitment to hone every facet of their being into this perfect self. A tiny, TINY portion of the human race actually accomplishes this, becoming their ultimate self. An even smaller portion pulls this off without planting the seeds of their own future destruction.


  I myself, for instance, have an idealized notion of myself as some kind of road-wise Mad Maxian nomad survivor/warrior who lives by his wits, his .45's and his motherfucking reliable-ass Toyota 4x4. Dealing out justice with his well maintained firearms and high level marksmanship. Escaping road gangs by clever improvised pursuit countermeasures, sheer driving guts and vehicle capability; harvesting precious gasoline whenever possible.


  My Apocalypse cat, Fuji, by my side. Stalking the ruins. Eking out an existence by sheer grit and and a plethora of useful skills. Our senses and instincts making us stronger than the sum of our parts.


  The reality is that when society breaks down and ravenous, desperate people begin going door to door and taking by force whatever they can take. When killing becomes something that happens without consequence except those you make in your own mind. When the only thing that stands between you and any single fucking thing you own is your ability to defend it.


  That's where the mental avatar of myself as a freebooting, vehicular-centric warrior/survivor goes in the shitter.


  While I'd LIKE to be a Road Warrior, forever prowling the wasted landscape in search of gas, ammo and spare parts in my fearsome armored and sweet looking 'Yota, I have none of the requisite skills required to survive even to the point where some Road Warrior kinda shit becomes plausible. I can barely change my oil, much less diagnose and fix a serious problem. I get frustrated easily and and tend to take it out on stuff that's pissing me off, causing more damage than what I was trying to fix.


  In reality, I see myself more as an 'Dying Towards the End of the Second Wave' kinda guy. You know, someone who has survived the massive first wave die out of the human race by the simple expedient of having enough water and grub to last more than a month. And who was prepared and successful in defending their stuff against those who'd run out and were willing to take what they needed from anyone they could.


  About four to six weeks after supply chains have completely broken down, power grids and cell service is out and water service is a thing of the past, there will a humongous 'First Wave' die-off on Earth, primarily in dense population centers. I don't have the numbers and to be fair, they're all just estimates and model projections anyway. No one can accurately calculate the death toll because a break down of systems combined with a population of these numbers HAS NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE.


  No one can predict the chaos that will ensue.


  It will be like God kicking over the universe's biggest anthill. Shit'll get crazy fast.


  What I will say is after this First Wave, things are going to get WAY MORE fucked up. While I have the wherewithal to potentially survive the First Wave, I will undoubtedly succumb to the Second Wave. This is where people with the initial supplies and resources to get by until now begin running out of stuff and having to make critical decisions.


  Choices such as:


-Do I simply start killing people for their shit?

-How many canned goods are a human life worth?

-Am I hungry enough to eat a dog?

-Am I hungry enough to eat another human?

-Am I hungry enough to eat another human without some decent marinade or dry rub options?

-Is life without electricity, vodka, hamburgers and online porn even worth going through the trouble?

-How can I take out as many people who have wronged me as I can before circumstances kill me or force me to kill myself?


  These will become very important options to some folks before their inevitable demise.



  While I'm willing to stand amidst the chaos and defend every last can of Hormel Tamales that I have stashed despite how they taste, once my shit is gone and I begin to starve, I can't rightly say what I'll do. Never been there before, starvation that is. Been hungry, but hungry and starving aren't as close of neighbors as you'd think.


  Would I just straight up eat another human? Perhaps a tender feral baby if I could manage to trap one of the clever little devils?


  I'm hoping I never get hungry enough to find out. but, truth be told, I do keep a secret supply of soy sauce on hand for marinade in case I ever have to eat people cutlets.


  And remember folks, if you're going to start using humanity as a food source, for fuck's sake use the whole animal. Don't be a wasteful cunt.


  Render the fat for lamp oil and waterproofing. Harvest the skin; it makes great leather and scares other people silly. Bones have too many uses to list. The point is, as with the Native Americans and bison, people aren't just meat so don't treat them that way. Have some fucking respect, ya fuckin cannibal.




  So thinking long term, in the unlikely event I live that long. I've been considering possible business opportunities in a Post-Everything America. I'm not gonna sugarcoat it, things don't look great. But in the end, I came up with the following ideas:


Uncle Herdy's Sharp Sticks™: I know, it doesn't sound great right now but branding is everything and as worldwide ammunition supplies dry out and mass production ceases, a sharp stick starts looking more and more attractive. It was the weapon of choice of tens of thousands of years because it's a proven two step system: A) Stab pointy end into enemy. B) Repeat as necessary. Or even, for advanced users. C) Throw the fucking thing.


  Even idiots can use one.


  I feel like if the end of civilization advances to a certain point, people might start looking more kindly on an expertly made Sharp Stick. Hell, if we regress far enough they may even become a sort of status symbol:, like


  "Hey. is that an original Uncle Herdy ya got there?"


  "Sure is. I had to kill SO MANY people to get it, but it was totally worth it! Bludgeons like a dream, bro!"



  Another equally promising idea I had was Darwin Jerky™.*1 In other words human jerky marketed to people who don't want to believe they're eating human flesh and are completely prepared to buy into the narrative of me somehow still having a cattle ranch somewhere with cows on it or some such nonsense. Nobody without a small army has cows anymore. Certainly not in enough numbers to make a commercially available jerky.


  But with enough smoke flavoring, red dye and milled texturing, I'm confident folks will love it and any doubts they have will be rapidly alleviated by their hunger pangs going away and that adorable flavor I've concocted out of various shit laying around. And maybe some heroin I found.


  Whatever. A small business man will need an edge in Post-Everything America. If I can get people to eat my brand of human meat sprinkled in heroin while masquerading as a pork or beef product, I'm gonna do it.



  We'll have to see how far society breaks down before I begin implementing my business plan. I'm probably gonna label it "Organic" just in case a few hippies survive the imminent madness. Broadest commercial appeal and whatnot.





Everything's gonna be just fine, you just wait and see.

-Uncle QuaranHerder











DARWIN jerky

Don't Arsk What's IN It

























*1 DARWIN is my abbreviation for "Don't Ask 'Really, What's IN it'?"


  

A Blogger Adapts To A Post-Strip Club World, Or, Quarantine Diary Of A Guy Who Used To Herd Strippers.

Quarantine Diaries, Chapter 62

  
  In the wake of the Meat Riots and the ensuing chaos that resulted, I had ceased to forage for the time being and lived off canned goods while the remaining populace enthusiastically slew one another outside my windows. Once the quiet crept back again I poked my head out to see what there was to see, scavenge what there was to scavenge.

  Who knew bacon, or the lack thereof, would be the straw that broke the camel's back?

  Turns out eight days was exactly how long America was willing to wait for more bacon before they lost their shit and began the true demolition of our society. Toilet paper was one thing, I guess, but allow the bacon supply chain to break down and everyone starts gunning down their neighbors all willy nilly.

  Fuck with bacon at your peril is the lesson future generations should take away from this.

  Every day brings new challenges and wonders. Today for instance I saw two babies fighting a raccoon by a dumpster over half a pack of Now And Later's that was crawling with ants. I chose not to involve myself but I was quietly rooting for the raccoon because those babies looked savage and gross. I didn't like babies much before they were feral and competing with rodents for sustenance and I certainly don't like them now when they're competing with rats to be the dominant nuisance species.

 
  The Meat Riots, while horrific and barbaric, did make the streets quieter. Mostly that's because of the rise of the Cannibal Cults, but you take the good with the bad in this quirky post-civilization world we live in.

  

  In related news, my neighbor has recently gone full cannibal and while I try not to judge, I can't help thinking "I really hope he's getting enough fiber..." I'm trying not to be a diet-shamer here, I mean it's the end of civilization, eat whatever you can get your hands on, ya know? If you've decided long pig is the answer and you're comfortable with it, who am I to judge? Just the other day I saw a stray beagle and thought to myself, 'I still have half a bottle of Korean barbeque marinade that probably isn't totally rancid yet, I should shoot that fucking dog and somehow eat it or something.'

  

  Problem is I don't know how to skin an animal and harvest its meat, nor would I want to if I thought it might’ve been called 'Bandit' or 'Loki' or at one point wore a bandanna or sunglasses in a humorous family photo.

  

  But clearly my neighbor, who looked like Paul Rudd before the Apocalypase, has figured out a way to trap the feral Girl Scouts that briefly ruled our streets and were a threat to every living creature that dared to dart from building to building in the shadows. Hoping against hope not to hear the distinct hunting calls of "Dosi!" and the return calls of "Doe!" closing in from all directions.

  I learned early on that if you're out foraging and you see a pristine box of Thin Mints, run motherfucker. Run. They're already all around you and they move fast, coordinate better than Green Berets and haven't developed the higher concepts of mercy or compassion in their small, animal brains yet.

  

  Somehow "Larry" has figured out how to snare the clever little  things since they've all but disappeared and Larry is the only human I currently know who's putting on weight and frequently has the smell of fajitas emanating from his door.

  

  I'm just putting two and two together, doesn't mean I'm right or that he's wrong.

  

  Wouldn't want to seem like I'm shaming anyone for doing what they had to do. God forbid.

  

  So my latest drama is with the Church of Steve The Savior, one of the foremost new Cannibal Cults that I mentioned earlier. You see, three days ago, I shot two of them dead through my door as they tried to leave a pamphlet that I clearly indicated I didn't want. I felt I was being more than clear by shooting them through my door and to be fair I did have to listen to one of them slowly choke to death on his own blood for like five minutes which was really annoying.

  

  Then, not ten minutes later as I was surveying the damage done to my door by me refusing their literature, two more of them entered my building without permission, openly ignoring the clearly posted NO SOLICITATION sign, and there went the rest of my magazine. Like fucking ammo grows on trees nowadays, sunshine.

  Silver lining though, their obviously ambushed corpses have dissuaded all the meek predators from coming anywhere near my door, although the smell is, admittedly, less than ideal.

  It's all about tradeoffs in today's new reality. In order to combat the stench of the rotting Cannibal Cultists outside my door, I ambushed a landscaping truck and stole a bag of quicklime, which I sprinkle daily on the corpse warning-heap outside my door.

  It helps a bit but I fear Summer's gonna be a bitch. I'm trying to decide if I even want to live in a post-air conditioning world or not, although in the end I suspect that it's all just a matter of when I run out of vodka and who might blow my brains out as I attempt to steal their supply of coping juice.

  That's where I'd put my money on how it all eventually goes down. I'd give it 2 to 1 odds of being headshot while attempting to flee with pilfered booze.

 

  Other notable contenders in my death pool include:

-Masturbates to death: 3 to 1 odds. I certainly realize the hazard it poses, but am willing to Face The Dragon every single day until it rots me from inside and one day, during climax, my entire midsection explodes and I expire before the last of my ejaculate and half digested pork n beans can drip off the ceiling.

-Eaten by neighbor, Larry: 5 to 1 odds. I'm probably too gamey unless he gets really desperate...

-Instantly commit suicide the moment the vodka runs out. Don't even try to steal any. Just paint a wall with my thinky-bits: 6 to 1 odds but trending upward.

-Run down while foraging by ravening bands of former Uber and DoorDash drivers who have donned bondage gear and now engage in an interleague sport based on mowing down pedestrians with rat rod Kia's and Corolla's with meat plows welded onto them: 12 to 1 odds. If it isn't a Prius or Tesla, you can hear it coming. Then you simply wait for the right moment and implement PLAN ONE.*1. If it's an all electric gang, the odds go up to 16 to 1.

-Taken down while foraging by unionized packs of stray survivor dogs who’ve fallen back on their  lupine heritage in order to survive a world where they are both predators and a possible burrito filling.: 20 to 1 odds. Not only do I have a special understanding of canine language, I can just shoot them.

-Killed by a post apocalyptic Road Gang’s Sub Boss while trying to protect my canned ravioli and Dinty Moore supply. Not even the Big Boss, but his mohawk’ed and chaps-wearing sodomite commando. Again, not judging. If I’m OK with cannibalism, butt sex, whether consensual or not seems sorta ‘not really my problem either’: 25 to 1 odds. I'm expecting this and have reserved several rounds of .45 Colt, which regardless of sexual preference will still put enormous holes in you, even if you have a mohawk or are wearing leather pants.

-Nuked:100 to 1 odds. It's not unrealistic to think that some top ten global powers have considered unleashing their nuclear arsenals. In layman's terms this means there will never be a better eighteen minute window in which to savage your genitals with no lasting consequences.

  

  I'll keep you posted on the outcome of my death pool as long as I'm able. But....you know. Probably won't be available to post a dying message with the pool winning method, so be conservative with your wagers.





  One of the members of my community is running a "food truck". And by that I mean he built a fire under a dumpster full of rainwater and boiled a few corpses in it with some lemon rinds and half a cup of salt. If I could leave a Yelp review it would read something like this.


  "I wasn't expecting much when the dumpster rolled out in front of my building, It didn't smell appetizing at first and when the vendor punctured the slime layer that had formed over the surface of the "stew", things didn't get much better.


  However, appearances aside, the stew was actually pretty awful. It tasted like how I always imagined soapy bath water that had been used to render down the fat of old people's cadavers would taste. That being said, this IS a review so therefore in the spirit of fairness I will say it was very meaty, the portions were exceedingly generous and served in a limited edition tactical helmet, which I thought was a nice touch.


  Was it worth one can of baby shrimp and one can of french cut green beans? Yes, but only because the 'while supplies last' tactical helmet soup bowl promotion, which frankly was genius. Would I eat from this dumpster again? No. Not unless a new wave of National Guard are deployed here and the helmet-bowl promo comes back."

  2 STARS





  Yours til next time,
-The StripperHerder Who Herds No More And Kills Religious Freaks and Would Be Ravioli Thieves

 

 

 

*1 PLAN ONE: Pump rounds through it until it stops moving.

 

Welcome To A Whole New World: Post-Titty If You're A Glass Half-Empty Kinda Reader. Gasoline Powered V-8 Madness And Vehicular Carnage If You're An Optimist Like Me.

  Here's the deal, despite the title I make no promises or binding agreements about the actual or theoretical content of the following post be it in regards to titties or any other subject matter mentioned in the title or forthwith.


  That's actual lawyer talk, I looked it up on a website so it's 100% true and legitimate.


  What I will state, in a Glass-Half-Empty sorta way, is that I wish things would go all Mad Max, preferably minus all the bondage and fetish gear if possible. If not, whatever. It's the end of civilization and there's no dress code like there would be in a civilized place. So wear what you want as long as there's some built-in weaponry with which you can kill people for their gasoline.


  Because that seems to be the point at first.


  Although arguments could be made that in this iteration, toilet paper will be the resource that ultimately breaks our society, I choose to put my faith in vodka and ammunition as my source of future wealth (both of which are Armageddon-Proof) And while I believe that this may be gospel, I'm preparing to wipe my ass with smooth rocks or ruined socks, while not having to resort to pistol-whipping a resource plunderer because I chose a clean ass over lethal self defense rounds.


  Water will somehow become important later, don't worry about it as long as those V-8's are being fed and mohawk'ed road bushwhackers are being bested and shot fulla buckshot, arrows and cleverly launched tire irons.


  Remember your "Pretending It's NOT the End of Society" Road Agent Training:



1) It is perfectly okay to waste 3 gallons of high test fuel by firing up your Blower to outrun Wasteland Twats for ten miles so you can harvest thirteen ounces of crappy 82 octane fuel leaking from a wreck by catching it in a filthy, dust streaked salad bowl. It makes perfect sense.


2) Weapons are everything, so load as many of them onto your person as you can effectively move under the weight of. Don't deny yourself any weapon system based on your probable ability to lug it around. Fuck it. If you can cram it into your V-8 Interceptor and effectively use it, it's worth the fuel cost.


  Remember, this is the shattered remains of civilization. It is Post cellphone, Post social media and Post instant communication. Ergo, if no one's around to record something happening otherwise, then as a Remnant Road Authority of whatever questionable gubbamint is left, whatever you say happened becomes fact by the simple expedient of everyone else involved was either slagged in a high speed motorway accident or failed to cut through a limb before a perfectly explainable vehicle explosion took place.


  They're all polygamist methheads anyway.



3) Methhead Road Cunts will always veer off when faced with an insane, sunglasses and glove wearing broken spirited cop whose family is dead by other, unaffiliated Methhead Road Cunts, most of whom rode motorcycles.


  Which is idiotic in a vast-open-space scenario with range weapons.


  But you can't stop them from doing it. Until you shoot them, that is.


  Which is super easy. They're just....really easy to hit and take down.



4) Don't trust children. Listen, the Apocalypse happened and we've moved on a bit. But there's tons of orphans of this circumstance who've gone feral and plenty more who will eventually join one wild pack or another as a matter of survival. This is one of two eventualities when parentless children are left unfed for prolonged periods of time. They either perish or join cult-like bands of other idiot kid survivor groups, each with it's own religion based on nonsense.


  Trust me when I say their social support network is MUCH deeper than yours and and when all hope is lost, my money is on them to come out on top.




5) When you run out of resources because what passed for government has finally collapsed, it's 100% OK to take whatever gasoline, tires, blower parts, air filters, teeth or any other resource you can scavenge from any other vehicle on the road that may happen to look bodged together or has anyone with goggles in it. Goggles are illegal. So are any other vehicles without a valid safety sticker.


  The manual says DO NOT run them off the road. PURSUE them until they crash and assist them if given a chance. 


  Assist them doing what is open to interpretation based on the wording. It's taken as a given the the good folks of a post-nuclear-exchange law enforcement jurisdiction would never go all Road Pirate and wreck cars for fun and profit. It's unthinkable.





   Fuck. That's all I have to say for now. What can I say, I'm out of practice.



  Still got the shitty, abrupt ending down pat though.


  Some things you can't unlearn.



 Your Future Twerk Rancher,
-Unky Herdy!