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Cow battles Part 32
Part 32
After a few days DeJesus Gomez figured he was safe. He had heard nothing since a few hours after he blew the house. He began to dig himself out of the tunnel. His water was about gone and no matter how tight he tied the garbage bags, the smell of human feces overwhelmed the tunnel.
He had a new respect for those gringos. Before this, they hadn't run into anyone that could fight. A lone farmer here and there might give them a little trouble, but nothing like this. Surely a group of farmers must have come together to make this attack, but some of them obviously had some military experience and they had military style weapons. He would lay low for a while but eventually he would avenge the death of his sons.
The Group started getting back to a more "normal" routine. It was spring and their was lots to do.
The cows they had traded for were doing well at their new home. It was decided that the Group would butcher one every couple months to supplement existing food stocks of whole grains, legumes, etc. During the hottest months of the year, the Group would not butcher one as it was too much work to get done trying to beat the heat before the meat spoiled. This meant they would not butcher a cow in the hotter months of July, August and September. This also meant that a larger smokehouse would need to be constructed before the early June butchering. Their would be no cool weather leeway in getting the meat put up.
Most of the Group members did have several hundred each of quart sized canning jars and lids. The bulk of these were purchased at clearance sales at big box stores as well as via Craigslists and yard sales. Some were given to the Group also. The jars and lids were one of many low cost items that were plentiful before everything happened that would be hard to make or find substitutes for later. Items like this were items that needed to be stockpiled. 10 cases per person was considered the minimum number for each family to consider. A few stocked that many but the majority did not. It wasn't until Jim and Kathy taught everyone how to can on a couple weekends that most of the guys realized how easy it was to go through 5 or 6 dozen jars. Then most of them got serious about stockpiling them.
This was one of the main ways Jim emphasized needs to the Group. Jim had told them repeatedly "we are living this way now guys. We learned some of this stuff the hard way also. The thankful thing was that we learned it while there was TIME to learn it, to correct mistakes. When you could run to Lowes to get replacement parts for your pipes that broke, etc. You all that come to the retreat at the last minute won't have the opportunity to correct mistakes in your preps at the last minute. Their won't be any "last minute" runs for supplies, once your here your here. We aren't risking everyone's OPSEC and security cause someone slack assed on their preps then figured they would play "catch up" as the world is going down. All it would take is some yocal noticing you loading six carts of food into your car and then follow you back here to ruin years of everyone's work."
On critical needs, situations and cir***stances would be set up in training and work weekends that would demonstrate the need for the items that people were lacking. One time wheat was to be planted in a prepared pasture area. Jim got everyone together, explained what they were doing and then said "go grab your rakes and shovels and we will get this done together." Only one or two HAD rakes and shovels already at the retreat. Still though, the work needed to be done. Those that did not have the basic tools used their shoes to drag dirt to cover the seed. Those people brought rakes and shovels to the next outing.
Still though, many of the individual members lacked for basic supplies in the quantity necessary. It is said that in any organization 20% of the people do 80% of the work and the Group wasn't much different than that. This was not a perfect world.
About a week after the attack on Gomez, Steve came to Jim and Bill with a medical problem.
"I had a filling fall out of one of my back teeth." Steve said.
"When did this happen?" Bill asked.
"It was around the time of the attack. I didn't think it was worth mentioning then." Steve said.
Bill had pulled some teeth during one of his tours in Iraq, but he had never filled one. Jim had taken a Field Dentistry class up in Tennessee years before and had stocked all the basic dental tools after that , including Intermediate Restorative Material (IRM) as well as Temporary filling material such as Cavit by 3M.
"One of the things I really wanted to get was a handpiece and a big compressed air tank. Eventually if things stay all messed up, we will need to drill as well as just fill." Jim said as they prepared a working area.
The working area was in Jim's kitchen. Jim and Kathy got together all the dental instruments that they would use and baked them at 400 degrees for an hour.
"Your mouth is funky enough, we aren't going to add more funk to it." Jim said joking with Steve.
Jim had done this before, numerous times on extracted teeth stuck in bondo in little cups in practice and had done it live before on relatives that had lost fillings. He hated the concept of them, but after doing his first "live" one with a mini maglite flashlight stuck in his mouth while he worked, he decided to buy one of these dorky looking head lamp flashlights and put it in his medical kit for reasons like this. He joked with Kathy "don't tell any of the guys I bought one of those things."
Two stout kitchen chairs without arm rests were used. Jim sat in one that was up against the wall with the table alongside. Steve sat in the other one right in front of Jim. Jim grabbed a hold of Steve's chair and slowly leaned it back to where it was resting on his lap. It made the best angle to see the tooth and work in relative comfort.
Sterile saline wash for contact lenses was used to irrigate the void where the filling fell out. Jim strapped the stupid headlamp on and glanced at the others waiting for some smart arse reply. All he heard was snickers.
Using a scaler, although that probably wasn't the best tool for the job, it was the best he HAD for the job, Jim gently scrapped the inside of the large void left by the lost filling.
"You feeling any of this? You want Kathy to put some Ambesol on your gums in that area? We aren't wasting any lidocaine on this, sorry. That and raising a wheel around a wound is one thing, using it in the mouth is not something I've ever done before. You can always kick Bill if the pain gets too bad." Jim said. Steve started to raise his leg as Bill moved back.
Kathy cut up some 4x4's and rolled them into little rolls and holding them with a hemostat Jim did his best to dry out the void.
"It's too bad we don't have any compressed air." Jim said.
"Just a second, it might not do much, but it's all we have." Kathy came back in with one of those little battery powered personal fans. It didn't do much but it helped.
"Kat, can you mix that up for me?" Jim asked pointing towards the IRM.
Kathy mixed it up and Jim took the paddle spreader and started putting it into the void the lost filling left.
"Oh shoot, we'll need a little paper or something to check his bite when I get done with this. Oh and a wire brush.." Jim said
"HUH?" Steve mumbled.
"Just kidding. We are going to use the dremel." Jim said. Steve's eyes got wider!
"Actually no, the dremel is too fast and their is nothing to cool down the tooth as your using it. Could have bought an imported handpiece for around a $100. The tank, fittings, etc. probably wouldn't have set me back much more than that. Coulda, woulda, shoulda huh?" Jim said.
Jim smoothed out the filling and it came out pretty nice for guerrilla dentistry. Kathy cut some little strips of paper and Jim had Steve bite down and grind on them. He scraped a little bit with the scaler and had Steve bit again without paper. He said the fit wasn't bad.
"OK just to be safe don't eat anything for a couple hours and avoid any sticky stuff or gum- not sure we even have any left- for a day or so. I'm gonna give you some Doxycycline to take for a couple days. If their is any swelling or redness from the site let me know. If it looked like stuff would be back to normal soon I would have used the TFM, but since it doesn't, I used the Intermediate. A real dentist could drill that out later if you wanted him too. So it's permanent enough but not completely permanent if you know what I mean." Jim said.
Steve sat there for a minute moving his jar back and forth. Then he said to Jim, "do you think things will ever get back to normal?"
"God I hope so." Jim said. "We'd really like to get you all the hell off our land!" Jim joked.
After a few days DeJesus Gomez figured he was safe. He had heard nothing since a few hours after he blew the house. He began to dig himself out of the tunnel. His water was about gone and no matter how tight he tied the garbage bags, the smell of human feces overwhelmed the tunnel.
He had a new respect for those gringos. Before this, they hadn't run into anyone that could fight. A lone farmer here and there might give them a little trouble, but nothing like this. Surely a group of farmers must have come together to make this attack, but some of them obviously had some military experience and they had military style weapons. He would lay low for a while but eventually he would avenge the death of his sons.
The Group started getting back to a more "normal" routine. It was spring and their was lots to do.
The cows they had traded for were doing well at their new home. It was decided that the Group would butcher one every couple months to supplement existing food stocks of whole grains, legumes, etc. During the hottest months of the year, the Group would not butcher one as it was too much work to get done trying to beat the heat before the meat spoiled. This meant they would not butcher a cow in the hotter months of July, August and September. This also meant that a larger smokehouse would need to be constructed before the early June butchering. Their would be no cool weather leeway in getting the meat put up.
Most of the Group members did have several hundred each of quart sized canning jars and lids. The bulk of these were purchased at clearance sales at big box stores as well as via Craigslists and yard sales. Some were given to the Group also. The jars and lids were one of many low cost items that were plentiful before everything happened that would be hard to make or find substitutes for later. Items like this were items that needed to be stockpiled. 10 cases per person was considered the minimum number for each family to consider. A few stocked that many but the majority did not. It wasn't until Jim and Kathy taught everyone how to can on a couple weekends that most of the guys realized how easy it was to go through 5 or 6 dozen jars. Then most of them got serious about stockpiling them.
This was one of the main ways Jim emphasized needs to the Group. Jim had told them repeatedly "we are living this way now guys. We learned some of this stuff the hard way also. The thankful thing was that we learned it while there was TIME to learn it, to correct mistakes. When you could run to Lowes to get replacement parts for your pipes that broke, etc. You all that come to the retreat at the last minute won't have the opportunity to correct mistakes in your preps at the last minute. Their won't be any "last minute" runs for supplies, once your here your here. We aren't risking everyone's OPSEC and security cause someone slack assed on their preps then figured they would play "catch up" as the world is going down. All it would take is some yocal noticing you loading six carts of food into your car and then follow you back here to ruin years of everyone's work."
On critical needs, situations and cir***stances would be set up in training and work weekends that would demonstrate the need for the items that people were lacking. One time wheat was to be planted in a prepared pasture area. Jim got everyone together, explained what they were doing and then said "go grab your rakes and shovels and we will get this done together." Only one or two HAD rakes and shovels already at the retreat. Still though, the work needed to be done. Those that did not have the basic tools used their shoes to drag dirt to cover the seed. Those people brought rakes and shovels to the next outing.
Still though, many of the individual members lacked for basic supplies in the quantity necessary. It is said that in any organization 20% of the people do 80% of the work and the Group wasn't much different than that. This was not a perfect world.
About a week after the attack on Gomez, Steve came to Jim and Bill with a medical problem.
"I had a filling fall out of one of my back teeth." Steve said.
"When did this happen?" Bill asked.
"It was around the time of the attack. I didn't think it was worth mentioning then." Steve said.
Bill had pulled some teeth during one of his tours in Iraq, but he had never filled one. Jim had taken a Field Dentistry class up in Tennessee years before and had stocked all the basic dental tools after that , including Intermediate Restorative Material (IRM) as well as Temporary filling material such as Cavit by 3M.
"One of the things I really wanted to get was a handpiece and a big compressed air tank. Eventually if things stay all messed up, we will need to drill as well as just fill." Jim said as they prepared a working area.
The working area was in Jim's kitchen. Jim and Kathy got together all the dental instruments that they would use and baked them at 400 degrees for an hour.
"Your mouth is funky enough, we aren't going to add more funk to it." Jim said joking with Steve.
Jim had done this before, numerous times on extracted teeth stuck in bondo in little cups in practice and had done it live before on relatives that had lost fillings. He hated the concept of them, but after doing his first "live" one with a mini maglite flashlight stuck in his mouth while he worked, he decided to buy one of these dorky looking head lamp flashlights and put it in his medical kit for reasons like this. He joked with Kathy "don't tell any of the guys I bought one of those things."
Two stout kitchen chairs without arm rests were used. Jim sat in one that was up against the wall with the table alongside. Steve sat in the other one right in front of Jim. Jim grabbed a hold of Steve's chair and slowly leaned it back to where it was resting on his lap. It made the best angle to see the tooth and work in relative comfort.
Sterile saline wash for contact lenses was used to irrigate the void where the filling fell out. Jim strapped the stupid headlamp on and glanced at the others waiting for some smart arse reply. All he heard was snickers.
Using a scaler, although that probably wasn't the best tool for the job, it was the best he HAD for the job, Jim gently scrapped the inside of the large void left by the lost filling.
"You feeling any of this? You want Kathy to put some Ambesol on your gums in that area? We aren't wasting any lidocaine on this, sorry. That and raising a wheel around a wound is one thing, using it in the mouth is not something I've ever done before. You can always kick Bill if the pain gets too bad." Jim said. Steve started to raise his leg as Bill moved back.
Kathy cut up some 4x4's and rolled them into little rolls and holding them with a hemostat Jim did his best to dry out the void.
"It's too bad we don't have any compressed air." Jim said.
"Just a second, it might not do much, but it's all we have." Kathy came back in with one of those little battery powered personal fans. It didn't do much but it helped.
"Kat, can you mix that up for me?" Jim asked pointing towards the IRM.
Kathy mixed it up and Jim took the paddle spreader and started putting it into the void the lost filling left.
"Oh shoot, we'll need a little paper or something to check his bite when I get done with this. Oh and a wire brush.." Jim said
"HUH?" Steve mumbled.
"Just kidding. We are going to use the dremel." Jim said. Steve's eyes got wider!
"Actually no, the dremel is too fast and their is nothing to cool down the tooth as your using it. Could have bought an imported handpiece for around a $100. The tank, fittings, etc. probably wouldn't have set me back much more than that. Coulda, woulda, shoulda huh?" Jim said.
Jim smoothed out the filling and it came out pretty nice for guerrilla dentistry. Kathy cut some little strips of paper and Jim had Steve bite down and grind on them. He scraped a little bit with the scaler and had Steve bit again without paper. He said the fit wasn't bad.
"OK just to be safe don't eat anything for a couple hours and avoid any sticky stuff or gum- not sure we even have any left- for a day or so. I'm gonna give you some Doxycycline to take for a couple days. If their is any swelling or redness from the site let me know. If it looked like stuff would be back to normal soon I would have used the TFM, but since it doesn't, I used the Intermediate. A real dentist could drill that out later if you wanted him too. So it's permanent enough but not completely permanent if you know what I mean." Jim said.
Steve sat there for a minute moving his jar back and forth. Then he said to Jim, "do you think things will ever get back to normal?"
"God I hope so." Jim said. "We'd really like to get you all the hell off our land!" Jim joked.
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