ok, keno told you were they are, but you _get these items with pits, 2 or three next to each other, that you dig spaced randomly between the shelter and the nearest house. anything that wants to eat you, you lure into those pits. this is where you will find free food everytime you wake up from sleeping in the shelter (make a bed there with the stuff you get from smashing up a window and smashing up or deconstructing the benches and counters in that place)
you get the shovel by luck if you spy the proper store nearby, and you need to be too lucky to raid there without enough guile, so don’t count on that right away; so you get the shovel by breaking into nearby houses from the back, cleaning the window and scouting the house for thread, sewing kits or the bit of rope that you need to construct a stone shovel.
once you have a shovel, you win. big pits to kill stuff with and butcher little things with your pocket or steak or butcher knife every morning until your skill delivers meat most of the time. only then should you take apart the real sinew packages, err bears. with modest skill a bear can get you 8 bits of sinew, so don’t squander them.
so, its a bit of a chicken and egg thing with the wilderness survival cause you still want the houses to get the string to get the sinew etc. but fortunately you can find that by sprinting through the first houses you find (leave some windows open so you can run through those in order to shake anything that might want to eat you as you go)
also beware triffids. if you see them at the start, say goodbye to your shelter, don’t think twice, just leave until you’re 20 or so mins away. find a new home there, then go back and marvel while you snag some tasty veggie meat.
your best weapon at the start are humble rock shovel dug pits outside windows. at the rear for meat, at the front for zombie delivered goodies. later on, sneak into town during a storm at night to dig more of those, then just wave your arms around come morning so the Zs come to deliver. but that’s a different story. what you have here _should just help you actually get the sinew. which is cool. with plenty of running away you can have your first portable shelter up in a few days.
please ignore this if you can already go up against a bear 
