I'm so happy right now. For the first time, in almost two years, I've had my first taste of fresh meat. Glorious, wonderful, exceptional, tasty meat. I've never been a vegetables man, or a grains man for that matter, I've always been a meat person. Before I came here I had what you could almost call a carnivorous diet. Being this long with real meat was hell on earth. I'd almost forgotten how wonderful it was, but now, oh you have no idea how wonderful it was.

But let me get to the beginning, to where said meat came from. Over the past couple months I've had our people searching pretty strongly for ranches with intact grain supplies. We found a couple that were tainted, rotten, or empty, but about two weeks ago we finally hit paydirt. We found a ranch that had about 3500 or so bushels in its bins. Not as much as we found the first time, but well enough to top off our own storage containers, which we'd converted from semi-trailers, and then some.

As a symbol of friendship I send messages to the survivalists colony and the Americaneers informing them of my find and offering to share the wealth with them. They both responded cautiously but in a positive manner. I arranged to personally take a representative from each group to see it, and naturally they were pretty shocked at what they saw. Even after we'd taken our fill, about 1000 bushels, where was still 2500 to split between them, an offering given in the name of friendship.

I could have simply resealed the silo and left it there until we needed it again, but I didn't, and that meant a good deal. Over the past week we've been helping them fill their stocks with corn, and the benefits to my town are pretty strong.

The Americaneers have a large collection of educational holotapes that dwarfs mine. I had 3 months to prepare and a limited budget. They've been preparing for the better part of a decade and had the combined wealth of a number of dedicated survivalists to fall back on. I was however able to negotiate an exchange. I was sure to raid every bookshelf in town before we abandoned it, along the theory of no book, or serviable form of media, gets left behind. I love books and nothing is more important to me than the written word. While they were rich in Holodisc technical manuals, they were short on pure entertainment, something which I had an abundance of.

We traded a copy of their entire library for copies of my entire library, and copies of any novels that I had spares of, which probably amounts to be well over a thousand volumes. That might sound like a lot but considering I now had at least 500 in depth volumes on a vast array of subjects on my pipboy.

The survivalists were a community group really, formed as an emergency fallback plan they'd hoped to never use. They were well prepared but not quite prepared enough in some of the more long rage aspects of survival. This isn't to say they would have died out, but they'd probably had to eventually go tribal.

What they were, and are though, is something I thought was impossible. They're almost entirely self-sufficient in the line of food. While they had plenty of canned goods, and a small mountain of grain, they've had a greenhouse and a tilapia pond set up in their bug out shelter from moment one, along with ducks and chickens.

They way they ran it was ingenious. They grow duckweed, which is in turn eaten by their fish and fowl, which is in turn eaten, while the animal crap is dumped back into into the pond to grow more duckweed. They also use the nutrient rich water to water their crops. The only outside input is the feed that they give the chickens.

The rest of their biological waste, including sewage was composted for soil.

Naturally, they're pretty damned proud of their setup. They gave us some chickens, in thanks for the gift, along with the real prize. One of the older women said I was a sweet boy, and cooked up a beautiful herb roasted rooster for me to share with my wife... our little secret.

I know it was selfish, but we keep it to ourselves. It was so good it makes me want to cry. Kelly said I was a bad, bad man for not sharing, but honestly, I think she was just trying to guilt me into giving her my drumstick. Didn't work.

Anyways, I'm in talks with them about getting their help to set up my own pond. I already have some folks digging it, and we're traveling back into town to nab glass, bricks, and any unspoiled bags of cement we can find to serve as the lining. Gonna have to replan the palisade a bit though to fit it, but still, well worth it. If we can use this shortcut, we'll be able to start producing our own food by fall. Duckweed is edible, nutritious, and very high in protein, while fowl and fish are a source of meat, glorious meat, and fresh eggs.

From the sound of it, we're going to have to trade more books and possibly one of our vehicles, but they're willing to put in the effort to help us set up. At this rate I'll be able to retire from the whole Dictatorial Overlord position sooner than expected. I'm not going to miss it at all. Any suggestions for counter offers would be appreciated.

That 2500 bushels of grain bought me something worth more than a fully stocked, Vault, the good will of my neighbors. We're talking now, and showing more trust. Pastor's even started visiting the to attend to attend to their spiritual needs. Just three days ago, he baptized a child in the survivalist camp.

This, along with Helen's viewing of a bad post apocalyptic movie, has encouraged her to argue that we need a stronger line of communication. She wants us to set up a weekly postal run. She said that the Postman's daughter was right at the end, and communication facilitates the growth of community. Even though she claims to be an agnostic, she supports the Pastor's activities 100% and is trying to get him to encourage people to take the trip to visit the church one Sunday a month. She also wants to start putting on plays and show movies on Sunday night. She wants to make our little town the local cultural hub.

I think its a good idea, not only does it create bonds, but we could also become the local trade station as well. I'm thinking of appointing her our official ambassador. Considering her relationship with Bear, they're pretty much the perfect mix of "Speak Softly" and "Big Stick" a man could hope for. Doesn't hurt that they're officially an item now. I pity the poor bastard who tries to do that woman harm. Their death would be long and colorful.

Jake's radio station is growing more popular too, as is his little gang. The station I like. He's started letting others DJ, allowing them to pretty much run it 24/7. He also has agreed to give up Sunday morning to the pastor, to let him broadcast his even was able to convince him to give her a couple hours each night to put on something cultural. I think the two of them are getting along well. She says he's a sweet young man, but a bit misguided. I think she like taking in strays.

The gang of young people forming around him though, I'm not entirely comfortable with. He's an escaped con who's showing them the ropes as he knows them. I can see some benefits and while they're acting like, well, a bunch of rowdy teenagers they're keeping generally in control. The problem is that I'm not exactly sure they'll stay that way.

Jake is loyal to me personally and to the core members of our original group, but I'm not sure if he feels that way about the entire community. Over the past months I found out he had a less than stellar childhood to put it gently. He's distrustful of authority, especially hard force. Helen was able to get through to him, because frankly the woman's almost the physical incarnation of soft force. She has a talent for getting under your skin and appealing to you on an emotional level. Give them a couple more months and she'll be calling him nephew. I'm about the closest thing to a traditional authority figure he'll willingly give the time of day, the reason being I literally plucked his ass out of the post-apocalyptic wasteland, and I'm not the type to simply give commands, I explain my views and reasons for carrying them.

Well, maybe that's not exactly fair. He listens to Bear too. Honestly he's seems to gravitate somewhere between "Awe" and "Terror" when Bear's around. Then again, that's less respecting the man as an authority, and more the kind of primal deference you have for someone who's both extremely cool, and could unscrew your head like like the lid of a peanut butter jar.

Any way you look at it though, I need to take steps to ensure that he remains the troubled, but generally good natured young man that he's become, and not a pain in the ass rebel without a cause. I'm open to suggestions, but nothing too harsh. He's become like a kid brother to me, and I don't want to betray his trust or see him hurt. Far too many of the authority figures in his life have done just that, and I refuse to add to that list.

On a happier note, we now have enough housing for everyone. We've built several dozen small log cabins and towed in almost 30 mobile homes of various sizes. Not a lot of room to be honest, but enough that every family has some space. Some have asked to keep their tents to use as a collapsible additions, and barring any emergencies I've decided to honor their requests.

The cat breeding experiment is doing well. The first generation of modified kitten has pretty much reached full maturity. They're huge, easily the size of a fully fledged Maine coon and are extremely smart, and I mean lassie smart. The second half-blooded test generation are proving to be even smarter still. In a couple more generations I think we'll be looking at something the size of a mid size dog, with the power and strength of a wildcat, and primate level intelligence. As you can guess, I'm carefully breeding for loyal and affectionate nature.

That said, I'm not culling those who don't meet the standard. Not being born perfect is no crime, and even those who aren't are still good cats. Thankfully we have a vet on staff who can fix them. I only put down the ones that prove to be too aggressive to trust.

As for dogs, we have a number of them. Kelly's dog, for example, is a pit bull named Buttercup. She's a good dog. We're discouraging their breeding as we don't need the extra mouths, but we're not outright fixing them all since once live recovers from the attack they'll be needed. I expect the smaller breeds to die out, and for their to be a general increase in intelligence over the next 20 years. Darwin was far kinder to the dog than to the cat.