Chapter 57

Jenny, Ching Lee, JJ, RJ and Takeo were stepping out of the chopper on the east lawn as I walked out to meet them. Jenny and Ching Lee both had briefcases with them.

JJ and RJ each had a hobby box that I knew had a Lincoln log set. Takeo had a Tonka toy truck in one hand and a John Deere tractor in the other hand. I knew that when things settled down, I was helping build log cabins on the dining room floor and possibility a farm set.

There were boxes of toys I had accumulated in one of the extra rooms in the living area; they had plenty of toys when they came to stay with me.

After supper and an hour of playing on the floor, we put the kids to bed- they were exhausted and went to sleep quickly.

Jenny and Ching Lee opened up the briefcases and I received an in the depth assessment of the ranch that had been bought. There was a lot more involved than the text explained.

Marcy and Lorrie had been working on Indian Point Ranch ideas for a while. Jenny and Ching Lee had stacks of photos for me to look at and evaluate. There were photos of the ranch and everything associated with it, including buildings, bunkhouses, grain and storage.

I was not even half way through the pictures when I had objections. The hay and straw barn were one huge long building that held the complete winter supply of hay and straw. A wayward cigarette or a lightning strike and a wind and the winter’s food for all the cattle and bison would be gone.

I suggested that several separate pole barn type buildings be built with doors - to lose a little of it versus all was a lot of difference. It took another hour to look at all the pictures. They had dozens of different pictures for reproduction wagons of the era. There were dozens of pictures and pamphlets from those who still made horse drawn period wagons.

I figured there be some to supply the many Amish communities in the nation. Together we went through and picked out several styles we thought would work.

One of the ones I liked was called a sheep herders wagon. It was longer and wider above the wheels than all the others. I thought they would be great for sleeping two of us and long enough that our kids could sleep there as well. The downside was it would take two teams of horses to pull them.

I asked Jenny to check in with Cowboy to see if one team of Morgan horses or Clydesdales could pull that kind of wagon. The more I thought about it and the ideas the girls were floating for the project, a team of normal work horses could pull the wagon.

We weren’t loading months of supplies on them, just sleeping in them and carrying several weeks of clothes, although there may be a solution to the clothes issue.

There would have to be some modern things carried along, one being some way to keep food cold for the cooks. Heaven forbid there was food poisoning on this journey!

The same with a shower restroom trailer - heaven forbid the media printed a word that we were using latrines - surely, they would be taking pictures. My thought was they could be on the same style axles as the horse drawn, only heavy duty. All the manufactures had roller bearing axles as options to carry heavy weight.

A water wagon could also be acquired in the deal. There were pictures of them in the pamphlets; a stainless-steel tank could be substituted for the iron one. It could be driven away from the nights campsite and replenished from a water truck after dark. Same with the food wagon.

The girls had three pages of ideas and questions to ask and research when they went home. I wondered if enough work horses could be located and trained in time. Then there were harnesses and everything that went into a wagon train, that looked like we would end up with. I had ideas of my own to look into.

I did find out that Winchesters had already been ordered along with ammo for them, enough for everybody with plenty extra. There were lots of pieces to this puzzle to get in place.

James Clown - the manager of the guns and ammo department - was sure when he put the Winchesters on the rack there would be a lot of hunters and collectors that wanted to add one to their collection.

All the pistols that we had taken in as we changed over to the corporate standard Glock 40 caliber had been sold. The former Blackwater employees who wanted to purchase their former sidearms had done so.

Some were still in the vault, waiting for the owners to retrieve them when they returned from their foreign assignment or their training cycle.

Jenny, Ching Lee and I were up early; we allowed the kids to sleep a little longer. Lisa had sent their lesson plans for the next couple days. Jenny was going to play school teacher for those days. I was sure the lessons were going to be completed because Jenny did not want the wrath of Lisa for them not being done.

I went to the Oval Office to see stacks of newspapers and dozens of notes on my desk. My staff had highlighted news articles that they thought I needed to at least glance at.

There was plenty to look at; they were filled with articles about the news conference with plenty of opinions about the student testing the Department of Education had ordered.

The teachers’ unions were livid and had filed for injunctions and were in the process of filing lawsuits to stop it. They felt it was to evaluate teachers on a national grade level and not on a local or state level. They also were mad that they had not been allowed to develop the testing or have any input.