It's too early in the morning really, to be writing a journal entry, but I've been awake since just past 4 & am too excited or nervous to get back to sleep. If I do any more pacing around, I'm going to wake the whole house & they need these last 90 minutes or so of sleep. Poor MT, she's been stuck doing most of the entries for the last little while & this Journal was after all, my idea! I woke up needing to use the washroom - knew I should have passed on that last glass of juice last night but excitement was making my mouth feel too dry. I can put this time to good use, writing this & getting the kitchen fire & hot water for tea & coffee going. I've looked outside & it's a clear sky -not a cloud blocking the stars. Dawn will be here soon & with it, our first day of real work.

If it weren’t for the fact that I'd wake the house, I'd head out & start the barn chores. The animals wouldn't be too impressed though especially the horses as they're in for a long enough day. Mark & Annette gave them some nice hot oat mash last night, a 'stick to equine ribs' meal. I've thought too of heading across the road & leaving our neighbours another note but we’re not to leave the property without others being aware of it, so that's out. I'm too excited to read & everything we could possibly need is ready. It should be; all of us have checked a dozen times or more.

MT mentioned she's written more about the new neighbours than of recent developments in the local community, so I'll catch up on that news. With the radio station having received fuel for their generators, broadcasts are continuing, every 2 to 4 hours. They now try to broadcast at eight, noon, four, eight & midnight & advise people to tune in every 2 hours in between those times, in case anything new comes in that requires immediate transmission. First, our local population is at 1156, including births we've had. The newscasters noted that other than Ottawa, Lasalle & Sterling, they're the only station on the air in this part of the state. They're limiting registration of people to 25 miles out from downtown as that pretty much delineates the municipality's area of responsibility. I'll have to have Annette draw a map for the Journal & add to it as we learn about more groups, but most people are currently clustered either in town or within 5 - 10 miles of downtown on farms.

Wonderful news, we now have 2 doctors & 3 registered nurses, all of which are working out of the 1 doctor's downtown office. Currently, they're open as required with someone always at the office & both doctors carry walkie talkies. The office is pleading for 'd' cell batteries as their stock of those is running low. With the walkie talkies, they can be called from the office should their services be required. So far, they report that most of their work has involved dealing with minor injuries - cuts & burns. They've repeated their warnings that people be extremely careful with candles, lanterns & any open flame as well as sharp tools. About 15 women in town or close to it are pregnant & the clinic stated that anyone living further out who may be having a first baby or who may be alone might wish to come in at least once to be checked out. One of the RN's is also a post-graduate in midwifery & she's willing to travel out to more distant locations in order to perform prenatal exams. She'll be giving a short daily broadcast - about 5 minutes in length, discussing various aspects of labour & delivery. Thankfully, she & the other medical people are reminding mothers to be that pregnancy is NOT an illness, that most moms will do fine, as will their babies. We don't have to worry about that here for some months, but the reminder from a doctor can't help but be reassuring to our expectant moms.

The mayor gave his daily report yesterday at four; usually he tries to do so at noon, but he was out having a look at the work the body disposal teams are doing. He reports that the work is going well. Bodies are being collected quickly & with respect, (he stressed that point) & brought to the quarry. Currently, the concern is the ability to burn the corpses. While the city has various fuels available for this job, they would prefer to use liquid fuels simply as "starter fuel". He apologetically asked for donations of well-seasoned firewood. His thinking is that wood can be interspaced with the bodies - this is currently being done & periodically, liquid fuels poured over the pile & lit, turning the pile into a pyre. That sounds perfectly awful, yet must be done. A minister goes to the quarry once or twice a day & has taken it upon himself to read a service & say prayers. Being mindful that all faiths are probably represented in that quarry, he's keeping it as ecumenical as possible. Awfully good of him to do so.

A side note - the Minister, Pastor Stephen Erickson has announced that he's 'open for business'. The churches are too large to try & heat so he's presently using a Veterans' Hall downtown for services. He'll be holding daily services he said at 9 in the morning Monday through Wednesday, two in the afternoon Thursday & Friday & evening services beginning at seven o'clock on Saturdays & Sundays. He said he's varying the times to permit people to come when their schedule permits. He added that when he was not preaching or visiting people, he'd be at the Hall as often as possible & was available for counselling, fellowship, baptisms, marriages & weddings. Pastor Erickson has been a pastor here for 4 years now. He was new to this area, a single man & has been well received by those in his Congregation. He's a pleasant fellow, warm & very open - easy to talk to. I like him - he doesn't pretend to have all the answers but can somehow comfort you even when telling you that! He will be, fuel allowing, preaching for half an hour every Sunday shortly before lunchtime. That will be wonderful for those unable to get into town.

Back to the mayor & his comments. He once again thanked those in the community supporting his efforts to work for the town. Currently some 70 people are removing bodies from homes, businesses & streets & another dozen or so are seeing to their needs. The mayor & his City Hall staff now number 5. There is himself, 2 clerks, and a senior employee who was formerly part of the town's public works department & a janitor! Now these people are simply doing what work is required, never mind their former titles. The mayor told all within hearing that currently they're concentrating on putting the lists of people in some sort of order. He's got someone working on alphabetical & another few people listing groups along with their skills. I bet they miss computers. It sure makes such list making easier. As that is completed, he then wants to concentrate on "surveying" the urban area of our town. That will consist of checking buildings, counting what is still there as opposed to burned down or collapsed & reaffirming visually what buildings can still be occupied. Those buildings destroyed by fire, looting or collapse from the snow will contain materials suitable for use in other buildings or homes.

He also would like to put together an information package for people here, consisting of maps - he has lots of those available & weather & crop data for this area. Unfortunately, much of the latter will be old & perhaps out of date. IN the past few decades, there's been an increasing reliance on the net, downloading current weather data, dates deemed best to plant certain crops etc. Drew says where this may prove to be a problem is the fact that weather has been anything but typical these past 10 or so years. I can vouch for that - most years we go from one extreme to another, Witness this winter. It's been a long time since we had this much snow. Most farmers keep pretty detailed records however & thankfully, Drew always made a few hard copies of his computer files. He's send one in to town with Sarah when she & Alex go collect the men next week.

The mayor also mentioned doing some sort of survey of local roads, seeing which need to be detoured or which require an amount of work easily handled by a few men, shovels & gravel. Anything bigger, washouts & the like will simply have to be marked as impassable. He mentioned he'd thought of trying to set up roadblocks in case of trouble, but that there were too many ways into town & not enough people to man them. He's simply asked people to be vigilant & is trying to figure out some sort of "Distant Early Warning" system outlying people can use to warn others of trouble. We're thinking about that here too.

Eventually, some sort of law enforcement is going to be required. The mayor hopes most people will be too busy in the next few months to even think about stirring up trouble, but he'll be hunting for a few police officers to respond to problems. He also wants to think about some response to fire; bucket brigades, etc. These matters may seem laughably basic, but they must the thought about & dealt with, as must garbage collection. For now, we burn what we have - it's extra fuel if it's combustible anyway.

Ah, I hear some stirring from upstairs. I'd best hurry to the kitchen & make sure tea & coffee are close to ready. MT will be monitoring our efforts today & writing some notes as we progress throughout the day. Now, time to go prepare to get some blisters!