Installment 6.6: Shit happens

Martha beckoned Kenny over.  “You look like you are part of the SD-LA forces.”

“Yes, ma'am, I am.” Kenny said agreeably.

“Their hands are filthy.” Martha said.

“Give them a break.”  Kenny said.  “Some of them have been camping for ten days.”

Frustrated, Martha decided to skip being delicate.  “Their hands are covered with shit.  Can't you smell it?”

“No, actually, I can't.” Kenny said.

It is a proven fact that young women have a finer sense of smell than old men do.

Kenny waved a young man over.  “Hold up your hands.”  The young man complied.  Kenny leaned in so his nose was a foot from the young man's hands and took a big sniff.  “Holy shit!  How did we miss that?” Kenny exclaimed.

“Hey.  Not a biggie.  You have probably been busy and focused on other things.” Martha said.  “The big question is, what are we going to do about it.”

“Hey kid, how come you are wiping your ass with your hands?” Kenny asked.

The kid snorted.  “The toilet paper ran out after the second day.”

“Why is that?” Kenny asked.

“I overheard a couple of officers talking.  They said that the original mission was for a 10 hour transit and the BOM (Bill of Material) never got updated for the longer transit.” the kid said.

Kenny shook his head in disgust.  As an aside, he muttered to Martha “That is when you know organizations are rotten...when they are more concerned about CYA than in keeping people alive.”

Martha made a face.  She was glad she had been wearing work gloves when she drove the Cali truck.  The steering wheel was undoubtedly contaminated.  She as also glad of the habit she had picked up of rubbing her nose with the backs of her gloves when it itched.  It is a habit you pick up when you work on a farm.  There is no telling what is on the surfaces that transfers to the palms of the gloves...pesticides, bio-hazard, even cactii spines.

The embedded journalists captured the entire exchange.

Kenny called Akemi because she was his medical expert.  Akemi advised that one round of Oral Rehydration Solution be distributed that night and the team back at Escutia Farms would come up with a solution by morning.

“The only solution I can see” Akemi said “is to put up wash stations next to the ORS stations.  The people coming in first have to wash and sanitize their hands and then wash and sanitize their Igloos.  We are going to need a lot more of those tanks.”

Mick said, “We are tapped out.  Even between the four farms we are not going to have enough.”

Akemi directed them, “Then buy them.  Buy what you need and get them here.  The tanks.  Soap.  Bleach.  Buy them.”

Akemi called Kenny back.  “We need a plan to enforce having the 'campers' wash their hands and Igloos tomorrow morning.  Another thing you need to do is to call Commander Izzo and tell him to pass word up the chain-of-command.  They need to know that this epidemic might not be as virulent as we fear but they also need to know that they are looking at a secondary wave of Hepatitis and other fecal-transmitted diseases.”

“Ok, I am on it.  Have you considered that the trucks your people picked up are contaminated?  Martha wanted to pass word to everybody who has been driving them to wear Tyvek suits until they are washed out.” Kenny said.

“Good points.  I will pass them on.” Akemi said.  “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

“It seems pretty obvious, could use some new pit latrines and a truckload of toilet paper.”  Kenny said.  “The other thing is chow.  They are eating field rations and they are barely edible.”

“I work on the 'chow' problem.  I heard you are a trucker.  Can you find a source of TP.  I am pretty sure I can figure out how to get them paid.” Akemi said.  “Regarding latrines, we are going to split the camp and relocate in four, fresh locations.  The planners already have ditch-witches making trench latrines.  We could use some help getting the Cali trucks on-line.  Can you find out if any of your 'campers' can help us with that?  They might prefer driving to riding in back.”

“Hey Bucky...I got another job for you.” Kenny rasped into his phone.

Kenny heard a heavy sigh from the other end.  “What is it this time?”

“I need a truck load of toilet paper.” Kenny said.

“Come again.  Please repeat.  I didn't catch what you were saying.” Bucky said.

“I said, I need a truck load of toilet paper.  You know, ass-wipe.”  Kenny said.

“How big of a truck load?  Trucks come in lots of different sizes.” Bucky said.

“I need enough toilet paper for 80,000 people for two weeks.  You figure it out.” Kenny said.

“How you gonna pay for this?” Bucky asked.  “It ain't like they are going to give it to me on the basis of my good looks.”

Kenny said, “You tell them that El Patrón's number two man is asking for it.  Tell them that El Patrón is on the road to Sacramento with 80,000 soldiers and doesn't want people with shitty hands saluting him.”  With that, Kenny turned and gave the videotographers a big, stagy wink.  “If that don't work, tell them that the man who fed 40 million Southern Cali residents is good for whatever a truck of toilet paper is gonna cost.”

In the course of 15 hours Kenny had become a media star.  Everything about Kenny jangled the nerves of every producer and executive of the major networks.  Their instinct was to hank the feed.  Their training had them look at the viewer metrics before they did that.

Unlike old-style TV, internet feeds provide networks with instant feedback.  The key metric is 'stickiness'.  Do the potential viewers surf on by or do they stop and listen.  Segments where viewers pause and listen command a huge premium from advertisers.  The advertisers know that their messages will be delivered.

Every segment that had Kenny in it pegged the stickiness metric.  To the producers, he may have been a slow-motion train wreck but to the viewers he was fresh and authentic.  He spoke simply and his views were untainted by political correctness.  He was everybody's crazy uncle who was crazy like a fox.

Kenny did not know of his cult status.  The networks were banking Kenny segments so they could queue the most lucrative advertisers with his segments.

Next Installment

Sighting in a handgun

A friend came over with a newly purchased handgun.

He had taken it shooting and thought it hit high and to the right.  He had been shooting at golf balls and dirt clods on a dirt berm.

36 grain ammo at a nominal 1260 fps out of a long gun.

Of course, he had not brought any ammo.  The first ammo we tried, a target ammo had two, back-to-back failures to extract.  Then we switched to a "High Velocity" .22 LR ammo and had much more robust extraction and ejection.

Yup.  High and to the right.  This is my shooting five shots at 10 paces, the range the "customer" does most of his tin-can shooting.  I was using the box of the pickup as a steady rest.  Good for vertical but a little embarrassing for horizontal.

Of course I read the manual AFTER sighting in his pistol.

The first adjustment had no effect.  The bottom of the screw head was floating above the top of the sight and turning the screw down had no effect.  The second adjustment did move the group, perhaps just a little lower than desired.

The third adjustment for vertical looked pretty good.  We were still seeing horizontal stringing.  Time to work on zeroing the horizontal.

The circled group is where we left the sights.

There comes a point where you are chasing noise.  We could have kept fiddling with the sights for hours and my shooting would have continued to degrade over time.

Without getting all mathy about it, the gun hit (median distance) 1.8" from the point-of-aim at ten paces as delivered from the factory, with my eyes, with my ammo.  After sighting in it hit 0.4" from the point-of-aim.  0.4" is well within minute of woodchuck or raccoon or reptiles with bad attitude.

And if his first shot does not anchor him, well, he has nine more for back-up.


The other thing is that he will "hit" differently than I do.  He will not be using a truck as a steady rest.  His eyes are different.  And he may find that ten paces is not where he does his precision shooting.  I didn't quibble because I believe anywhere between five paces and fifteen paces are fine distances to zero a handgun.  He is going to have to shoot the gun for a while and do any fine-tuning that is required.

According to one of the on-line ballistics calculators, given this gun and ammo (1020 out of a 5.5" barrel):

• A five yard zero will result in a max rise above the line-of-sight of 4" and a second zero at 95 yards.  
• A seven yard zero yields a 2" max rise and a second zero at 70 yards.  
• A ten yard zero a max rise above the line-of-sight of 1" at 30 yards and a second zero at 50 yards.  
• A fifteen yard zero yields a max rise of 0.2" above the line of sight and a second zero at 35 yards.

For the record, my buddy did run out and buy a couple of boxes of Federal ammo, lot number 1RE082.  That should keep him shooting for a few months.

Waxed paper cups as a barrier to roots

Vitis riparia cutting.  Nothing special about this selection except it was a female and the cuttings were easy to collect.  You can click on the pictures to embiggen.

Roots blowing through the side of the cup

And growing through the bottom.

Not much of a barrier.

Installment 6.5: And the heavy lifting starts

Mick Scerba looked over at Akemi and asked, “What needs to happen first?”

Akemi said, “We need to find a way to make Oral Rehydration Solution and deliver it to up to 80,000 sick kids as quickly as is humanly possible.”

“What is in Oral Rehydration Solution? How do you make it?” Paul Nawrocki asked.

“It is pretty simple. It is 6% sugar and 900mg of sodium per liter of water.” Akemi said.

“Does it matter where the sugar comes from?” Mick asked.

“Nope. In this case, sugar is sugar.” Akemi said.

“Well,” Mick said, “you are in luck. We blend VB Very Best vegetable juice here. We have automated equipment. We have salt. Do you have any objection to using Biological Hazard Remediation money to buy a tanker load of fruit juice?”

“This is yours to manage.” Akemi said. “If that is the fastest way to get a half million liters of ORS out to those soldiers than get it done.”

Mick still liked the old fashioned desk computer. He said he could make the print larger and have more icons on the larger screen. Mick popped open one of those icons and logged onto ag-Bay. He entered the keywords 'fruit juice' and hundreds of offers came up. Then he sorted by 'delivery time to your registered address' from shortest to longest.

“Hangman Farms says they can deliver a tanker of chilled 24 BRIX Thompson Seedless grape juice in three hours. They want a 15% premium over spot price for the expedited delivery. What do you think?” he asked as a formality as he pressed the “Buy it now” button.

“I am also scheduling five tankers to show up tomorrow at three hour intervals.  They may have to walk up here to drink it but, by God, we will have something for them to drink.” Mick finished.

Then he called down to the mixing room. “Hey Sid, are you running anything now?”

“Nope. Things are slow this week.” Sid responded.

“We have a tanker of juice arriving in about three hours. The customer wants it diluted to 6% sugar and wants 900mg of sodium per liter. Can you read back what you heard so I know you wrote it down correctly?” Mick asked.

Sid sighed. Mick ALWAYS wanted confirmation. “We have a tanker of juice hitting the dock with an ETA of +3 hours. The customer wants the juice diluted to 6% sugar and wants salt added to equal 900 PPM sodium.”

“What kind of bottles did the customer order? I need to see if we have them in stock.” Sid said.

“No bottles. We are going to run it into foodgrade IBCs...those 275 gallon cubes, and truck it down to the army camp.” Mick said.

“Well, then you better find a but-load of them because we just shipped most of our IBCs out.” Sid said.

Mick looked up at the other three planners. “I need a little big of help here. Can you guys get on the horn and get some foodgrade IBCs heading this way?”

“That,” one of the young guys said, “is going to be complicated. We are on our ass for fuel and trucks.”

“Me too.” said the other young guy.

Mick looked over at Paul. Paul shrugged. “Me three.”

Akemi delicately cleared her throat. “I think I might be able to help with this. Can you line up some drivers?”

Akemi tapped in Kenny Lane's number. He was stirring vats of sticky syrup and was very grateful for the opportunity to stand straight and stretch his back. “Whatchya need?” he asked.

“I think I can get you off mixing detail but I need some information. Did Cali leave any usable trucks behind?”

“Yup, they left behind hundreds of trucks. Why?” Kenny asked.

“Do you know if they have any fuel in them?” Akemi asked, ignoring Kenny's question.

“Don't matter. They left their fuel trucks behind, too. I am sure a bunch of them still have fuel in them.” Kenny said.

Akemi said, “I am sending a half dozen drivers down to the camp. Can you show them where the trucks are?”

“I am kind of busy right now but I am sure I can find somebody to help them out." Kenny said.

Akemi hung up.

Kenny called Brigid. “Hey Brigid. I gotta ask a favor. Is there any chance you pilot can show some drivers how the trucks are laid out? They are particularly interested in the fuel trucks. Your guy can probably help them figure out which ones are going to be easiest to cut out of the herd.”

“I am on it.” Brigid said. She beckoned over her pilot and a couple of film crews. "I have some action happening with the trucks. I want you two” she said while pointing to her crew members “to embed with the drivers.” 

Then Brigid pointed to the pilot, “I want you to show the drivers video from the fly-over. That will give them the best overview of how everything is laid out. Reshow them anything they are interested in.”

Kenny went back to stirring syrup.

The planners, hearing “...hundreds... and ...fuel trucks...” did not send six drivers. They sent thirty. The drivers noted how much fuel was in each truck as they moved them to open up a lane to drive the fuel trucks out of the laager. 
They lifted up the driver's side windshield wiper of the ones with more than half a tank and parked them off to the side. In less than a hour three fuel tanks and twenty-seven flatbed trucks were heading back to Paul's and the young guy's farms to fuel equipment and to pick up IBCs.

At eight in the evening Akemi called Kenny again. “It looks like we are getting close to having premixed ORS. Where do you want us to start?”

Kenny said, “I need to have you start at the far end of camp. We have been doing the best we can but the logistics are killing us.”

“Kenny, you sound whipped. Why don't you help ramrod the distribution at the far end. Can you have them pre-stage their five gallon buckets, or whatever, next to the road. We can off-load really fast to those and then they can decant to water bottles.” Akemi suggested.

Forty-five minutes later Martha Agulara drove the first truck into the camp. She had three IBCs on it with the spigots projecting out, beyond the bed of the truck. Martha was a 34 year old, single mother of a couple of young teenagers. She was always first to sign up for any extra work. Martha resembled nothing so much as a fast moving, inquisitive ground squirrel.

Martha did not know it but she was going to make a lot of money over the next two weeks.

She drove to the end of the two-track and stopped beside a pyramid of “igloo” beverage dispensers. She hoped out to see how the unload was going to happen and was unhappy by what she saw.

Martha had straw-bossed more than her fair share of young field crews. The soldiers she saw clearly had all the signs of severe dehydration.

“All right, kiddos.” Martha bellowed. “The first thing you are going to do is drink a bottle of this miracle cure BEFORE you do anything else. Then you are going to fill a cooler and move it back to your tent. Then you are going to come back here and drink another bottle of VB's Best.”

The “kiddos” lined up and dutifully did what they were told. They did not have enough energy to argue. The film crew that had embedded with her captured it all and it instantly up-loaded to be viewed worldwide in near-real-time.

Next Installment

S.O.S.

Mr Pepper's birthday is this month.  He will be turning 84.

I accompanied him to the Secretary of State's office in Hastings, Michigan.

He took two of the tickets when he entered.  He mumbled, "I know that." after I pointed it out to him.

After about forty-five minutes the clerk called his number.  He took a slight detour on the way up to the counter.  He handed his extra number to a mother with a young child who entered the facility significantly after we did.

I think the old coot planned that all along.