Not Dead in the Heart of Dixie Read Online Free PDF Page A

allows some of their employees to work from home. I don't know what I'd do if he had to drive an hour to work and an hour back every day.
    Marisa's employer called and told her not to come into work the rest of this week. She works in an office building near the hospital , making sure the insurance companies are billed correctly. I guess the hospital and doctors will have to wait to be paid for this week’s treatments. I'll bet the insurance companies are doin’ a little dance.
    Jason's a fry cook at a local truck stop , but he is supposed to start school next week to become a big rig trucker. He recently had his thirty-first birthday. I'm thankful he has some sort of ambition. He has a five-year-old son named Michael who lives with his ex-wife about fifty miles from here. We get to see Michael every two or three weeks.
    Nana and Pop are snug as a bug in a rug in their big ol' house a couple of miles from us. Their neighbor of forty years helped Pop board up the windows.
    Pop is seventy years old now. He needs a little “window-boarding-help” when times get tough. Nana says they have enough food to last a couple of months and for us not to worry. I won't worry as long as the power is up, the phones are workin', they have all their medications, and Pop doesn't have to go out in the yard and play cowboy with some lowlife trying to take advantage of him.
    Pop has a very nice collection of burglar deterrent devices and he knows everything there is to know about each an d every one of them. He can out-shoot me, and I'd bet he could out-shoot you. He was raised with three very competitive brothers. They probably had their first .22 LR's before they were out of diapers.
    Pop spent several years as a motorcycle cop when I was a kid. A revengeful drunk driving c lient took care of that career when he ran his big ol' Ford truck at full speed smack dab into the side of Pop and his motorcycle.
    Pop flew over four lanes of roadway and landed in a ditch. He got a pin in his hip, several broken bones, lots of cuts and bruises, and lots of weeks of therapy to learn to walk again. He also got a lifetime of pain. After that, Pop held a couple different positions at a couple different companies and then, retired. Now he's a full time fisherman and grandchild spoiler.
    Nana can make a killer chicken and dressing , but she's not fond of the bang bang, slice 'em up, side of things. Her parents had a huge garden and they canned and preserved from the time they could walk until the day they died. Anything they had in abundance was given to family, neighbors and friends. They'd give you the shirt off their backs.
    Nana knows how to "put things up." She may have to reach way back in memory to get it done, after all, she spent thirty-nine years in a classroom. She's an energetic little thing who sp ends forty minutes every day except Sunday on a treadmill, and about five hours every day cleaning house. She's a church goin' southern lady and she's also a grandchild spoiler.
    My sister and her husband are stuck with my nephews in Bristol, Tennessee at a hotel near the big racing arena. She says the owners have boarded up all the windows at the street level and there's plenty of food in the kitchen and plenty of drink at the bar. Their racing buddies are with them. They'll take care of one another. I know my sister can take care of her family. If you cross her, she will take your lunch money .
    Rumor has it that the school re-opening will be delayed indefinitely. Amber and Carisa are not sad about that. They're spending time at the piano with Carisa trying to teach Amber a few things. She's picking it up quickly, the little sponge.
    Anyway, there are numerous breakouts of the unknown illness in the cities and sporadic breakouts in the suburban and rural areas. Being bitten now carries a 100% infection rate. They are calling it HDI which is short for "Human Death Immunity."
    Several trucks on the Interstates have been ambushed. The drivers have been