Entry 50

The rain sang me to sleep last night. I had expected to sleep well since I was so tired, but I ended up sleeping amazingly. I left the front door open so I could hear and smell the rain throughout the night. It was very peculiar, I felt better this morning than I have in a very, very long time. Not just since everything went to hell, but better than I have in over a year. Not sure how to explain that.

The rain never let up throughout the night and continued throughout the day. The clouds and rain obscured where the fire had been. Hopefully the rain stepped in for the absent firefighters. If nothing else it might have gotten everything wet enough so it will not spread and just burn out. Without the fire bearing down on me the pressing need to scavenge is gone.

Even with the fire likely gone, it is only a matter of time till the next big problem happens. I have been on the streets. I have increased my food supplies and more importantly gotten tools I would likely never have found in these apartments. I have to keep going out there hunting for more supplies. It also occurred to me that I should probably write down what I find in places that I leave. Who knows what I may need in the future. I doubt I will be able to remember what each store had months from now. I will have to work on some system for that.

For today I kept it simple. I am even more sore today and I was not sure I could survive another supply trip. Plus staying out of the rain seemed like a good idea. I moved up all the supplies which I left in the laundry room and got them sorted out. While I was down there I remembered I wanted to get into the closet. So after the supplies were taken care of I started to work on the door.

I was going to drill out the lock like I had on the apartments, but I really wanted to conserve the charge in the drill. This door was made of wood so I figured it was worth taking a crowbar to. After awhile of prying at the door I realized the door jamb where the lock connected to was starting to splinter out. I used a hammer and the crowbar to tear out the wood and soon the door swung free of the jamb. It made me wonder if the door jamb might be weaker than the doors themselves. If I cannot get better at picking locks I will have to find a way to get through doors without a drill once the charge is gone.

There was actually a lot more in the laundry room closet than I would have expected. I remembered they were remodeling one of the apartments on the first floor. Someone had lived there a long time and finally left so it was the last apartment to get updated. It looked like all the tools and supplies they were using were being stored here rather than being lugged up and down the stairs every day. It explained why some rather common tools like wood chisels and a circular saw were missing in the utility room. Most of the tools were duplicates of those I already had. There were two cordless drills and 4 batteries. Two batteries were on chargers and two on the drills so hopefully at least two were fully charged. There were some more specialized saws, crowbars of varying sizes, and a variety of fasteners. The real gem of this closet was lying on the counter, likely tossed there by a worker at the end of his shift. Two keys: master keys.

The first thing I did after grabbing the keys was to climb upstairs to try them. I unlocked the utility room and several of the apartments I had already gotten into. With these keys I could easily access any apartment. I would no longer have to drill out locks, cut through walls, or smash door jambs. It made deciding what to do tomorrow very easy. Tomorrow, I will start cleaning out the ground level apartments.

I tried on some of the clothes I'd brought back and found a set which looked good for apartment digging. My set had extra pockets for holding a flashlight and whatever else I pick up. The guns still pose a problem. One of the pairs of pants came with a narrow canvas belt which I think I can use as a shotgun sling. I would need to sew it back together though, something I do not know how to do. I found a light jacket with a pocket that holds the pistol pretty well. Not perfect but it fits close enough that the gun stays secure and is still easy to reach.

I have the supplies somewhat organized. I feel there is some way I should organize supplies in a survival situation, but I am at a loss as to what it would be. As it stands food is kept in my kitchen which seems logical and the majority of the supplies are in my bedroom and front room. Just the tools and building type materials are kept in the utility room. Good enough for the time being I suppose. As I sort through the lower apartments I can try and figure out a better system. For tonight, I will just focus on getting some rest so moving does hurt quite so much tomorrow.