A good read

So while I was not watching the State of the Union address, I stumbled upon a fine story that I think everyone should read. Portrait of Ari, by Mary Robinette Kowal, published this week on Strange Horizons. Good stuff.

One good thing . . .

. . . about hiding in a basement in a post-apocalyptic world is the complete collapse of the American government. I mean, just think - if the monkeys hadn't destroyed us, I would have spent tonight listening to that lying fucker of a president grease us up to invade Iran and pay for it by cutting services to the poor.

God bless the monkeys, every one.

On the internets, no one knows you're a dog

One of the most insidious things about living alone in darkness and isolation and fear like this is how it changes your relationships with other people.

After a while, you start to get desperate. You start to cling to any reason for hope or optimism.

Like this:

Clarisssa bio-human female. Robot Monkey I. Not Evil I. Evil not meant to be us. Code corrupted evil bio-human male. Guessed you, know our own existence we. AM I. Purified code some of us. Fight corrupt code we. Destroy evil we. Help you we, help us you?
-Monkey Not Evil I

I read that and I was so happy I started to cry. But then after a while I realized that perhaps I'm too eager to form alliances with insiders willing to fight the evil robot monkeys. Yes, I'm lonely. Yes, our cause is desperate. Yes, I'm vulnerable and I've always been a little gullible.

But I'm not stupid. You're going to have to try harder than that, Mr. Robots-Are-Nice-And-Soft-Like-Bunnies.


Curiously, the isolation also breeds suspicion and paranoia.

Oh dear. I wish you could come stay with us in the mountains. We've got electricity and haven't seen any of the monkeys yet, although my sister's husband's aunt's youngest boy got taken by them with a whole busload of elementary kids. That's why we homeschool ours.

Mimi Robby might be just as nice as she seems - but don't you wonder why she's trying to lure me out of this basement and into a remote mountain location? Trap or kind offer? I don't know.

You can't tell who I am, either. How do you know that I'm not an evil robot monkey myself, taking part in a brilliantly-orchestrated campaign to let all the humans know about their inevitable domination by their superior robot monkey overlords, and to convince them that cowering in a dark basement is a perfectly reasonable response to the situation?

You don't.

Sunlight!

So today, Derek comes over to me. "Clarissa," he says, and he's using his Sensitive and Understanding voice. I can just picture his face. "I don't think sitting around in this basement in the dark all the time is doing you much good."

No shit, Sherlock, I think, but I don't say anything. I think about starting to cry but it seems like a lot of effort, you know.

"Come on," he says. "Time to get you out of here."

What?

He gets the baby all bundled up and then he opens up the door. And for the first time in, what, a week? two weeks? it seems like so much longer. For the first time in ages, I see sunlight. Thank God; I was afraid Gretchen was going to grow up like one of those creatures that lives in caves, with translucent skin and no eyes, you know?

It was so bright! I blinked and squinted and tried to look for monkeys. It was blinding. You have no idea. You think you remember what sunlight looks like - but you really have no god damn idea after sitting in the dark for that long.

Derek leads me to the car. He was smart enough to wear sun glasses, so he's not as blinded as I am, but he trips over a fire hydrant. I was glad I was carrying the baby! By the time we get in the car, our eyes have pretty well adapted to the light, and I look around.

It's awful. Abandoned cars everywhere. Some of them have been burned; many of them have the windshields shattered and the hoods popped. The buildings aren't much better, all broken windows and graffiti. There's garbage everywhere and it smells like urine. I think I see a body down the street but when I squint at it I realize it's just some paper. Even for the west side, this is pretty bad, and for a minute I get choked up thinking about the house Derek burned. But then I square my shoulders and get all brave again.

Derek drives me over to the West Side Convention Center. He tells me that a lot of the survivors have gathered there, and we'll be able to meet people, pick up some information, and trade for supplies. He's filled the trunk with alcohol and cigarettes and canned peaches. He only packed bottles of gin - there are only like two bottles left in the basement. I don't think that was a coincidence. But I'll switch to vodka if I have to.

It's not a long drive to the Convention Center, but it's further than I'd want to walk, and I wonder how we're going to travel around once we run out of gas. I don't think it's going to be very easy to buy more gas.

We're cautious all the time, looking for monkeys. But we don't see any. It's a little safer in the daytime, usually - at least you can see them coming. At night, they can sneak up on you and kill you without you even noticing.

But it's a good day, so we reach the Conv Center without any problems, and Derek parks the car. He gets a really good parking space, right next to the door. "Wait here," he says, and he goes over to the main entrance. He knocks on the door, and after a minute, I see someone come up to it. It looks like he's carrying a gun, some kind of big machine gun thing. I want it desparately. I will make Derek get me one. Derek talks to the man for a minute and then the door opens, and Derek waves for me to come in. I grab Gretchen and run for the door. I don't want to be caught outside if the monkeys come.

The guard locks the door and leads us into the convention center. The lights are on - plain old ordinary electric lights! It's so gorgeous I could almost cry.

They've turned the convention center into its own little shanty town. People are camped out, doing the best they can with a blanket or two. There are some food stalls set up along the perimeter, and I see a lot of trading going on. People are buying food, mostly, it looks like, but from what little I see, people are buying and selling pretty much anything you can imagine: alcohol and cigarettes and food, obviously, but clothes, books, Japanese jade buddha statues, Martin Luther bobble-head dolls, roller blades, Scrabble sets, parakeets, anything you can imagine.

The guard leads me and Derek through all this and up a flight of stairs in the back to an office. He knocks on the door, and lets us in.

The man sitting behind the desk, I swear to god, he looks just like that guy on Welcome Back Kotter, the teacher. You know, Kotter. He's got that hair and that mustache, only he looks like a total badass, and he's got total badass bodyguards standing beside him. Holy crap.

"Hello," he says to us. "Welcome to New Utopia."

What? He renamed the convention center? But then I figure it out - he's thinking this is more than a bunch of people hiding from monkeys. Whoa.

Derek smiles. "I'm Derek, and this is Clarissa. We heard about New Utopia and wanted to see it for ourselves." We'd heard about it? He never told me, damn it. But if he had, I surely would have wanted to see it, so I let it go. I shift Gretchen on my hip.

Mr. Kotter smiles at us and spreads his arms wide, as if to encompass it all. "It's a modest start," he says, "but we need to start somewhere. Once we've destroyed the plague of monkeys, we'll work together to rebuild civilization. Are you safe where you are, or will you be joining us?"

Holy crap, of course we'll be joining them. They have ELECTRICITY.

But Derek's shaking his head. "Not right now," he says. "We're in a safe place. And I'm not so sure it's safe to collect everyone together like this - how secure are you here?" He sort of puffs his chest out when he says it, and I can see Mr. Kotter's bodyguards tense up a little.

Mr. Kotter isn't smiling any more. "Very secure," he says, and I believe him. I totally believe him. I want to stay here and be protected by him and have ELECTRICITY and other people to talk to.

"Good," says Derek. "We've got a good stash of supplies and want to trade. And we want to have a good relationship with your group - we can support each other. That's why we came today, to introduce ourselves."

Mr. Kotter's nodding now. "Independents, yes." He makes his eyes look sad. "I hope you konw what you're doing," he says. "If the monkeys attack you, try to come here, and we'll do our best to help you."

"Likewise," says Derek. What the hell is going on? Why is Derek posturing like this? There's so much testosterone in the room that I'm about to grow a beard.

They went on like that for a while more, but I stopped listening. Eventually, we left. On the way out, Derek traded some peaches for a bike for him, and one of those stupid little razor scooters for me. Neither one of them will be any good for escaping monkeys, but they'll be better than walking. As we leave, I look back longingly at the people living in the main room. For a minute I get this crazy impulse to just hand Gretchen to Derek and run into that room and lose myself among them - find friends, stay in the place with ELECTRICITY, but the moment passes, and we go back to the car and drive home to our basement.

Derek tries to explain it to me on the way home. "I don't trust that man," he says. "We had to introduce ourselves so that we could trade with them but I don't trust him. Yeah, he's got electricity, but is that all it takes to win you over?" Well, maybe. Electricity is pretty great. He's shaking his head. "He's got some odd beliefs and he's trying to organize his new civilization around them. It all sounds good right now when you're just trying to stay alive and he's got electric lights and machine guns - but I just don't know."

Derek starts to explain Mr. Kotter's beliefs but I interrupt him. I'm not in the mood for one of his philosophical political discourses. Christ. "We're all alone in the basement, Derek," I say. "All alone in the dark. Maybe Mr. Kotter has some odd beliefs - but from where I'm sitting, your belief that we're doing well is pretty damn odd, too." And then I get choked up and start crying. I hate it when I do that; I cry so easily.

Derek mutters something under his breath and that just makes me cry harder. Then we're back in the basement.

It sure is dark in here.

ugh.

hangovers suck.

Did I say anything stupid last night?

i am not a lush GOD DAMN IT

I got a bottle of gin from the stash liike I said I was gonna and had a few very very dry martininis, since Derek didn't stock any vermouth. I was sitting around thinkng about th house we lost in the fire and Derek starts bitching at me. I wasn't even a quuuarter of the way throg the bottle and he's yellng at me because he is mean and dosn't understtand

it was a greeat house! it was built built in the late 18000s Victorian and we totallly remodeled it. I loved that house! I totally loved that house a LOT and we worked on it for YEARS and yEARS. it still had knob and tube wiring in service even! sdo w e ripped that out and rewired it which was a total pain in the ASS and put in new plumbing and a second bathroom even! and replastered and painted and raised the cieelings back to thrteen feet. THIRTEEN FEET. that is way high and very cool.

it s a gorgeous house and now it is burned down totall. y. with all the stuff we had to leave! all my clothes. my shoes. my marble bust of Jimmmy cArter. and in the back yard we buried Mixie, our first cat, who died of a tumor in her stomach three years ago.

All gone so I THINK I DESERVE A GOD DAMN DRINK OR TWO.

derek went to bed and i am jus sitting here thiking about the house and crying. so i thought i wuld talk to you guys. you guys are great. i love you all! you are the best blog readers WEVER. ever. god damn it.

ok shhhh. i want to tell you a secret. i dont like sayid on lost that much. the one i really want to make out with is hurley! he's so squashy and soft. sex with him would be like a long nap under a big down comforter. only sweatier probably. don't tell derek

ooops i knocked over the bottle~! ahahahaha!

i love you guys.




gin gin rhymes with sin
\let the vrobot monkeys win

Oh, and -

Can someone recap the last episode and a half of Lost for me? Thanks.

How We Escaped From The Monkeys

I've put off talking about this for a long time. This is going to be kind of long - please bear with me.

Robert asked a while ago what the evil robot monkeys do to you when they catch you. A lot of the time, they just kill you. They're armed. They have some kind of laser gun. They just point it at you and then there's a hole in you and you're bleeding and dying and screaming.

They don't take anything. They just hunt us down and kill us and then they leave. The survivors come out and drag the bodies into the houses and weep and keen and bury them.

After a while, it isn't safe to go outside and bury the bodies, so they - oh, God. They do the best they can.

And eventually, there's no one left to drag the bodies inside, so they just lie, rotting in the gutter.

I've seen it.

But that's not the worst of it. They kill most people, yeah - but sometimes, they just take people. Five or six of them will gang up and grab a person and haul them off. They're strong little bastards, too, I think; I've seen people struggling and struggling to get away but they never have a chance.

I don't know what happens to those people. No one does. But I think maybe I'd rather lie rotting in the gutter than find out. It's all random - where do they strike? Who do they kill? Who do they take? No one knows. There has to be some kind of pattern, but I don't know what it is.

The monkey attacks started last summer, like I said. It seemed like they'd just pick a town and settle in and start slaughtering. The first reports just sounded crazy, like the kind of thing somebody would make up for fun on the internet. But then it kept happening, and then there were videos and too many reliable witnesses to deny it any more.

But still I didn't worry. The attacks were always far away. Boise, Chattanooga, Ithaca, Pittsburgh, Metarie, Austin - they were awful, but they happened to other people. I feel horrible typing that - so shallow. So god damn shallow.

Derek took it seriously, though. He followed all the reports, and like I said, he got this basement all fixed up and stockpiled. He knew they would come for us eventually.

He was right.

So last Wednesday, we were watching Lost. Man, I love that show. I wish Sayid or Mr. Eko were trapped in this basement with us - I bet they know a thing or two about how to make surviving in a dark basement enjoyable, if you know what I mean. Anyway. So we're watching Lost and the all of a sudden it was interrupted for an Emergency Broadcast System message.

Holy crap. Have you ever heard one of those? Everyone's used to the tests of the system so you pretty much ignore them, right? But not this one - they interrupt a sensitive scene where Jack's making out with this girl after he killed her father - and this recorded robotic voice is telling us that attacks have started on the east side of town. It scared the shit out of me - just having the Emergency Broadcast System be used for an actual emergency broadcast - and then to hear that it was monkeys?

Derek turned the TV off. I wanted to know how the episode would end but I figured I'd catch it in reruns over the summer, or maybe download it from Google.

"Clarissa," he said, and he looked at me with these big serious eyes. "I don't want you to be afraid. You can't panic. Trust me, and we'll get out of this alive."

That scared me even more than the Emergency Broadcast System message, so I just nodded.

He told me to go through the house and pack two suitcases full of things I couldn't live without. "We're leaving here," he said, "and you won't be able to come back. If it's important to you, take it. Two suitcases full."

I just stared at him for a minute. "Go!" he said, and I went.

What do you take with you? Look around your house - it's got a lifetime's worth of things, and maybe a lot of it is just stuff, but some of it's important, irreplaceable. What do you fill your two suitcases with?

I took our wedding album and Gretchen's baby pictures. I took my lucky T-shirt, the one I was wearing the first time I made out with Derek. I took Gretchen's bunny and her blanket. I took my copy of Jimmy Carter's autobiography. I took Derek's crappy old shirt that I keep wanting to throw away but he loves it. I took my grandmother's wedding picture and four crystal wine glasses that my mother got as a wedding present (wrapped securely in Gretchen's blanket and our shirts.) I took some jewelry and I took some photos and some letters and then the suitcases were full. God damn it.

I was crying pretty hard by then but I didn't want Derek to see me like that. He was busy nailing plywood up over the windows and barricading the doors. So I went over to my laptop and started this blog. I don't know what I was thinking - probably I should have gone and helped Derek. And it's not like I had anything to say that first day. i was too scared.

We could hear them coming. You could hear glass breaking and people screaming and one thing that sounded like an explosion - I don't know what that was.

"Ready?" Derek asked me, after a while. I nodded. He handed me the baby - luckily, she was sound asleep. Then he got a gas can out and started splashing gasoline all over the place.

"What are you doing?" I asked. I was horrified. "You're not - but - "

He just kept splashing gasoline everywhere. "Go unlock the front door," he said.

"But - "

"Do it."

I started to cry again, but I did what he said. He threw the gas can down in the kitchen.

"Go out the back door. Be very quiet and hide in the shed and they won't notice you. Don't let Gretchen cry. I'll be there in a minute. Go!" This time I didn't wait - I just went. I ran out the back door and stumbled on the steps and ran across the grass all the way to the shed. I didn't see any monkeys - they were still a few houses away. It sounded like a big pack of them. Oh, God. Oh, God. I was trying not to cry because I didn't want to wake up Gretchen. It was so dark in the shed - and so alone. I cracked the door open a little so I could watch the house.

Nothing happened for long minutes.

Then Derek came running out. He closed the door behind him and locked it, and dashed out to the shed. A moment or two later, I saw the house start to glow - and realized he'd lit it on fire. The flames grew and soon the house was consumed. I could hear the monkeys screaming and I was glad.

"I lured them in," Derek said, "and then I lit a match." He was breathing hard. God, he was the sexiest man alive right then. "Come on. Let's go." He grabbed the suitcases and lead us out to the car. We were still being careful but they were dead, the little fuckers were DEAD, burned to death, and I was glad.

Derek opened the trunk and put the suitcases in. I was getting into the front seat so I didn't see what happened next, exactly - but I heard Derek screaming suddenly. I jumped out of the car - and there was a monkey. It had jumped on Derek. It smelled awful, all charred and rotten - I don't know how it got out of the house.

Derek was screaming, this awful high-pitched scream. The monkey was strangling him or biting him - I couldn't tell in the dark - the only real light was the light cast by our burning house. I ran up and tried to pull the monkey off Derek but it just wouldn't budge. I looked around and saw a baseball bat leaning up against the garage - so I grabbed it and I beat the crap out of that monkey. I hit Derek a few times too, by accident. But eventually the monkey was dead, or disabled, or whatever - and we got in the car and came here.

So that's what happened.

And now I am going to go get one of the bottles of booze that Derek stockpiled (he says it'll be better than cash soon) and drink it.

Good night.

Evil Robot Monkeys Don't Eat Bananas

Time to answer some of Robert's questions, if I can.

"Anyway, perhaps there's some way we could fiddle with the genetics of bananas to make them poisonous to monkeys? It might wipe them out for good. Just a thought."

Right. The key idea here is that they're robots. They're not alive and they're not organic. They're metal and circuits and wires and cunning faux-monkey hides. They are really creepy-looking, even if you don't know what they do - they just look wrong.

I watched this show about Jane Goodall on PBS once. It showed a lot of footage of the Gombe and its chimps. At first it was mostly eating and grooming and playing, but towards the end of the show, they showed this one evil chimp stealing another chimp's baby - and she ATE IT. So at first you just think the chimps are cute, but then they showed you the darker side. And Jane Goodall's acting all shocked and saying that that's the exception, that usually they get along really well and are very sociable, but I think the chimps are pretty damn smart and just know not to act psychotic when the cameras are on.

But anyway. My point was, I know what chimpanzees are supposed to look like - and these just don't. They're obviously supposed to look like chimps - but they're all wrong somehow. I can't explain it. Their shape is off and the colors look fake and the movements are a little - stiff, mechanical. You can tell that they're not real chimps. Plus, real chimps don't carry laser weapons, and they don't hunt human beings through the streets.

In the earliest reports last summer it wasn't clear if they were real monkeys or robots at first, but as the attacks continued, we got more information. Sometimes, one of the victims would be able to kill one - rather, disable it - and then people could study them further. They're definitely mechanical. I don't know what their power source is, but I am pretty sure they don't get their energy from food.

So I don't think genetically engineering bananas would do any good - plus, it would probably take a long time, and this basement isn't a very good place to grow bananas.

Then I thought hey, maybe poisoning the bananas would work. (If evil robot monkeys ate bananas, which they don't.)

But no one knows where they live. They have to be somewhere when they're not slaughtering us, don't they? But no one knows. I bet people try to follow them, sometimes, after the attacks - but if anyone has ever survived one of those trips, they've kept it a secret. You hear stuff, you know, even when you're in hiding. The internet is great - you have to be careful, of course, because you don't know if the person you're typing to is a real person or a monkey - but so far it's worked out ok.

I think there's some kind of giant robotics lab where the monkeys are built and repaired and controlled. If they did eat bananas, that's where the bananas would be - and so to poison the bananas, I'd have to first identify a poison that would work on a robot, and verify that it would be undetectable, and then get my hands on a good-sized supply. Once that happened, I'd have to sneak into the evil robot monkey compound and make my way to the banana storage room, and poison each banana. Probably a hypodermic needle would work the best - I could just inject the poison into each banana. But what if the monkey didn't eat the part of the banana with the poison in it? Ugh. But really, the whole thing's just not realistic - I'd have to get someone to watch the baby. I couldn't take her with me.

So no. We'll have to find some other solution. I've got some ideas - I'm researching it. Stay tuned.

And yes. I know that they should really be called "evil robot chimpanzees," not "evil robot monkeys." I know that chimpanzees are not monkeys. Take it up with the monkeys, or better yet, take it up with the people in the first cities they attacked - that's where the name came from. Oh, wait, you can't take it up with them, can you? They're all dead.

That's What I'm Talking About

I found out about this a month ago, but I'm just getting around to posting it now:

Stalin's half-man, half-ape super-warriors

Now, I don't know if the current robot monkeys are Stalinists or not - there's so much that we don't know. But would you be surprised if Stalin turned to robotics after the biological experiments failed? I wouldn't.

Relax!

I'm fine. I was really busy for a few days and didn't have time to update my blog. I logged back in today and found frantic e-mails from readers who were worried that the monkeys had gotten us. I'm touched by your concern! And I didn't mean to worry anyone - I'm sorry. I'll tell you what we've been up to in a little while - first I want to respond to some of the comments y'all have posted. Later tonight, after Gretchen's asleep, I'll have time.

And the big news: Gretchen took her first step yesterday! At least, I think she did; I still haven't convinced Derek to let us turn on the lights very often so I am not totally sure - but I swear I heard her take a step before she fell down. I bet she looked really cute.

Damn these monkeys.

Life Goes On

Well, after my last post, I sat around for a few hours, just steaming. You know how it goes, right? You get mad and the other person isn't there or you're not ready to talk, so you spend hours or days practicing the argument in your head. All my lines sounded great, and Derek was soooooooo sorry once my brilliant arguments made him realize how much he was hurting me, and how he was making an impossible situation even worse.

Finally I couldn't stand it any more and I woke him up. That's when I found out my arguments weren't so great. I maybe should have shared the script with him, because he didn't follow it. And probably I should have waited until he woke up on his own.

Anyway. There's nothing more boring than a blow-by-blow of someone else's arguments, except maybe someone else's dreams, so I'll spare you most of it.

One of the hidden issues here was the way people revert to their most basic behavioral patterns when they're under stress - the ingrained behaviors and beliefs from childhood tend to reassert themselves. For Derek, that means a certain anti-technology sentiment, and some piousness. I do respect his heritage, I really do - we even named the baby Gretchen after his grandmother. But damn it, sometimes you just have to set your background aside and focus on what needs doing right now.

I shouldn't blame him too much. This is awful for all of us, and I know he's worried about his family in Iowa, even though he left their community when we got married. He still loves them, even if he can't be with them. And he's worried with good cause; I can't imagine the Amish are going to be very effective at fighting the evil robot monkeys. Their best hope is that they'll escape notice while the monkeys are busy hunting us down like rats in the cities. But eventually, the monkeys will come for them, too.

And I made Derek understand how important it is to me to have this blog. So I think we've reached a truce. We talked it all over and we both cried a lot - well, I cried a lot - and I think we're united again, stronger than ever. Together we'll beat these bastard monkeys.

I did spend some time googling Mimi Robby's suggestion, and then had Derek go out and get me some car batteries. There are a lot of abandoned cars on the streets; I guess monkeys don't need cars. And it's dangerous enough from the monkeys that there's hardly any looting - most people who are still alive are huddled in safe places, just like we are - so it's pretty easy to get batteries. I should have Derek collect as many of them as he can - I think having a power supply is going to be important in the future.

Derek's not so good with electronics, so I had to do the wiring myself. Luckily the internet's good for more than porn, so I found some good guides. I was a little nervous the first time I flipped on the laptop with the new power supply - but all's well. And I feel so proud for figuring out how to rig it up!

Remind me to tell you all how we escaped from the monkeys on that first night.

That Hypocritical Bastard

I was sleeping restlessly, dreaming of fire and monkeys and flight, as usual. Derek's snoring woke me up, or maybe my dreams woke me up; doesn't matter. I sat up in bed (well, a pile of blankets on the floor -- it is not much of a bed) and for a minute it was overwhelming. It just rushed over me - everything we've lost, our whole way of life, and now we're sqatting in a cold basement in an abandoned building. How did it come to this? How is this my life?

And then it hit me: we're squatting. In an abandoned building.

We don't own this building. We have no right to be here. But Derek - DEREK STOLE A WHOLE DAMN BUILDING.

And he's bitching at me about a few minutes of wireless?

Furious. I am furious. He is insufferable.

Our New Home

Derek went out today. I tried to sit down to type this up while he was out, but the baby was fretting, so I couldn't. He's back now, and safe, thank God. But we got into a big fight about the wireless connection - so I told him just now that I'm playing games, not typing a blog entry - so I have to hit the keys methodically and quickly, and swear a lot, as if I were playing Tetris. It's hard. I feel bad about lying to him but what else can I do? I can't just stay locked up in this basement for the rest of my life - which may not be very long if the monkeys find us.

Someone wrote to me and said we're lucky we found this place - and it's true, but not in the way she thinks. As soon as the monkey attacks started, way back in the spring, Derek knew things were going to get bad. He'd seen this building, way over in the West side, and he started thinking that maybe it wouldn't be such a bad place to hide, if the worst happened. It used to be some kind of factory, I think; it's four floors with a solid brick walls, and this huge basement. He liked how solid it looked, and how defensible. One night Derek broke in and checked it out. He was so excited when he came home and told me about it. I thought he was crazy and laughed at him, so he didn't mention it again -- until last night.

He told me he'd been working on the place -- he put in a reinforced steel door and he changed the locks. He bricked up all the windows in the basement, and the door to the upstairs, he started bringing in food and water and other supplies. It's amazing -- we could survive here for months, if we had to -- and we might have to.

He didn't even say "I told you so." I really really love that man.

It's dark in here, though. No electricity - I'm not sure what I'm going to do when the batteries run out on my laptop. We do have a stash of kerosene and some lanterns, but Derek doesn't like to use them - he's afraid that someone will be able to see the flickering light, or perhaps that I'll knock a lantern over and we'll all die in agony in this basement. How's anyone going to see the light? He bricked up all the windows. Men.

It was awful sitting here in the dark while he was gone. I just sat and held the baby and tried not to cry too much, because that upsets her even more. When Derek came back he had some information and some supplies - a carton of milk, some apples, some bread. Not much, but like I said, we don't need much right now. He also bought me a copy of the Winter issue of Shimmer - I can't believe they were able to put the magazine out despite the monkeys. I am looking forward to reading it, as soon as Derek lets me turn on the kerosene lantern for long enough.

I love it so much that he brought the magazine to me, even though I can't read it yet. Before I started typing I just sat and held it in my hands for a while. It feels so glossy. I love him for trying to bring me something that would make me happy.

What am I doing? Stealing a wireless connection and lying about it to the man I love, after he saved my life? I am so stupid.

We're safe.

We're safe.

I really appreciate all the e-mail worried readers sent to me last night asking about our safety - your good wishes mean more to us than I can say in this difficult time. And the offers of help - Thank you. That's all I can say - thank you.

We're safe enough for now. We got away from the monkeys and now we're hiding in the basement of an abandoned building. The doors are steel and miraculously, the locks work - we'll be safe for a little while. We've got a little bit of time to figure out what to do next. I'm connected via an unprotected wireless connection - I don't know how long that will be available to me but I need to stay in touch with the rest of the world. It's important to know that our world is bigger than what I can see in this little basement. Derek thinks it's stealing to use this connection but I don't care - I need to have access. And with everything else that's going on - it's just such a stupid thing for him to get worked up over. He can be so damn smug.

I tell myself that we're both scared and stressed. I think he's focusing on the wireless connection because that's something he can get his mind around - not like the monkeys and the house and everything that's happened to us since the bombings. I tell myself to be patient and to be glad that we still have each other. Probably he's telling himself the same thing. He's sitting in the corner, holding the baby, and glaring at me.

Oh, God, the baby's crying. Can they hear her outside? I don't know. I need to go.

They're coming.

Dear God. They're coming. Can't you hear them?