Many cars become "lawn ornaments" or hit the "yard" once they get over 12 years old

Yep, it's all my fault - plus we has a shop fire that burned everything to the ground. Dealing w/Insurance co is a pain and trying to remember all we had out there. We have lots of photos but they don't capture everything. Anyway, Finally replaced the Alt and elect output went from 9.5v to 13.7v. But I still have a short to find. I had hoped the short was inside the Alt but after 2 days the battery was dead. It's charging now so I can start looking for the short. I have a couple of methods for finding shorts but if anyone has a easy way? I plan to put a test light between the disconnected Neg cable and the Neg Post then pull fuses until the light goes out and I ID the circuit. Then I can slowly narrow it down from there. I am also disabled - I had 4 knee replacements and expect #4 to fail one day. But every freakin thing is slow when a walker is needed to move anywhere... But it is what it is & I'll make the best of it, but I am very slow as you can see. I really appreciate all the help. BTW, it seems like the car was hit with several problems at one - low Alt output, a short somewhere, and the trans doesn't shift from low. But I'll tackle 1 at a time.