Zombie Run. Geekiness and athletics are like oil and water.

Oh the Zombie Apocalypse! The meme seems to have spread everywhere in Pop-culture these days. As someone who writes zombie stories I suppose that I should be delighted by the sudden upsurge in my favored genre. And in fact I am. Tickled!

There are movies and tv shows and novels aplenty as everyone seems to jump in with both feet. Enough to feel drowned out in the clamor. Zombies in nerd/geek culture have been huge for decades, many of us look forward to the coming zombie apocalypse, to the point that I named my first novel Rapture, reflecting my view that my people look forward to the undead uprising with the same rabid fervor that Evangelical Christians reserve for their expected return of Buddy Christ.

Have you ever discussed what you would do in the advent of the Zombie Apocalypse? This seems to be a rather popular pastime. In fact, such a conversation was the catalyst for starting my stories. Such discussions seem to be growing popular, often starting with the simple question of :what are you planning to do for the zombie apocalypse? (I have a second blog that deals with the apocalypse and necessary skills that will be needed to survive)

My answer? Simple! As I question the quality and quantity of my luck, I plan to eat as many brains as possible until one of the crummy survivors finally puts me down. I don't put my chances at surviving to be very high – in fact I expect to be among the first to come down with the plague. Yeah, I am taking a slightly pessimistic view of my chances at surviving this a highly unlikely catastrophic event.

And now the infection is spreading exponentially, one infected survivor at a time.

Folks have been competing for world records on Zombie walks - a special event where people dress as zombies and parade through the streets of a given city. The city where I currently reside had one in the last few years and I believe that they even took the title.

In the last two years Walking Dead has become a hit television show. Though I've never seen it.

Then there is this Cracked article about why you 'secretly' hope for the Zombie Apocalypse. I am of course calling Bull Shit! I make no secret about any of those reasons. In fact they all seem rather bang on and obvious to me.

The united states military has gone so far as to run practice drills around a zombie outbreak. Really they were focusing on a response against a biological weapons based attack but just mentioning zombies these days really gets people's attention.

The whole world has gotten into the spirit of the mass-extinction of humanity! Now the mainstream society, starting with the athletic type folks are getting down with the sickness. Our society now combined zombies with exercise in the zombie run!  Which makes a bit of sense, as the first rule is always Cardio.

A zombie run? What is this? I imagine you ask, in a hilarious squeaky voice. Two of our friends were entered in the race. Which is why we went. Now I'm passing what I've learned onto you.

Well, here in the Big Grapple they set up a 5k(3 mile) loop in the downtown area. The runners wore white ribbons tucked into their shorts. The zombies were out on the course, waiting, which is what zombies do. The fucking undead don't have any ambition. And when the survivors approached they were mobbed by the zombies, who would go for the ribbons.

Also, there were the runners. So many pretty girls, and like the previously mentioned zombie walk, many of the contestants were dressed up. In the few minutes I was there, I saw at least 2 Batmen, and one Captain America - along with a giant pile of dirty dirty hippies. Shit, it was like a Comic con for Athletes! Mind you, this is a weekend on which Halloween is often celebrated for party purposes. So that could have influenced the showing.

I'm told that there were props and set-pieces to make the experience seem more realistic.

I don't know. I didn't run. My shins are borked(have I mentioned that here or was that my other blog?) and I'm not in near good enough condition to run so much as a mile, much less the full 3. Besides that, it was cold and windy. So we booked it for a coffee shop down-town. I rather wish that the weather had been nicer.

When we returned we found that neither of our friends had survived the gauntlet, but they had managed to complete the course. So huzzah for them.

As for myself I think that I shall stick with my previous plan, flawed though it may be, and try to make a bazillion bucks off my zombie novels and then in turn invest in land and an impressively fortified(and provisioned) homestead.

Post-Apocalyptic Thoreau - the way he was meant to be.

Really, the idea of getting away and becoming more self-sufficient intersects with another of my long time passions. The Apocalypse. From the Tripod Trilogy by John Christopher through the Mad Max movies and then onto the Zombie uprising.

Self-sufficient. A strange concept to ponder in our current society where trades have been broken down into tasks via assembly line thinking. I doubt that I'll ever become completely so, not without vastly streamlining my life well beyond what I'm willing to sacrifice. One would have to embrace the primitive hunter-gather lifestyle and enschew all modern technology opting instead for whatever one could make with their own hands. To survive without needing to rely on the untrustworthy others.

This is the only path to true self-sufficiency. In the words of Thoreau “Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!” Cut down your affairs to the bare number possible to keep yourself alive. (Thoreau argues that you need to live a good life, be good for something – largely he seems to have some suggestions while leaving the reader to define exactly what that means.)

Food and shelter. Your life will be a constant search for these if you wish to live the simplest life possible with the fewest possessions. And, in the case of the apocalypse, this may be how many people are left to live. Either as hunter-gathers or as scavengers on the bones of society(I prefer the latter, but it is the more treacherous of the paths).

Bah on that noise. In this respect I don't want to simplify but rather to expand. I want to learn more about the world, to feed my curiosity(sadly I am easily distracted and quickly flit away to the next shiny object that drops in my path). I want to build myself a mountain of knowledge and save as much of the memory of humanity as possible. This is why I'm building my library. I am an introvert and a hermit, but I still want people around. People who can share the burden of learning and knowing.

Only an utter fool goes through life alone and turns away help from friendly hands. In many cases I have been this utter fool. I think I shall try to change this. I think that I will likely fail. I wonder if I could gather and set up my own self-sufficient community of Future Apocalyptic Survivors. Or does that sound like a cult? Or worse, the plot to The Village.

My Skills blog lists some of the areas of knowledge that might come in handy. My own pallet is largely useless and difficult to apply in the modern world. I'm left hoping that my experience in weaving chainmail will be a valuable asset after the collapse.

*if you wish to join kindly compose and mail an essay relating your applicable skills along with a recent headshot.

In 8^th grade we read the novel “The Girl Who Owned a City” (Objectivist Propoganda) about a plague that only left prepubescent children alive. That fired my imagination for years, until my voice changed and I began collecting my own odd assortment of body hair. Afterwards, I had to drop my admittedly silly plans of trekking to Alaska and fetching food with a BB gun. Oh well, other scenarios were always there to fill in the gap.

In recent years, I've settled on the idea of finding a parcel of land away from a population center. This is in part where the previous post comes into play. Find land, and produce food. Ok, I suppose that is easy enough, I live in America and we've a lot of space and if we get a proper apocalypse where the lion's share of our species ceases to be, well then more for me. Still, I should quite prefer to get a few years of practice in afore the end. A dress rehearsal before going on.

*I predict that the world will end soon after Sarah Palin is elected president in 2016. Soon after she'll somehow release the zombie plague while visiting a secret CDC facility. I like to imagine it will involve her tripping while trying to walk and chew gum at the same time. That leaves me with 4 years to work with. Better get cracking.

So my to do list: Find land. Build house. Gather knowledgeable companions to join me in my mad quest. If video games have taught me anything, I will meet them along the way and after a brief interaction we'll become fast friends and trusted allies. I'll need a healer, builder/mage, fighter and thief to round out my party proper. I'm working on my Mandolin skills so that I can fulfill the role of Bard.

To date I've not managed to accomplish any of these Herculean tasks. A few hurdles stand in my way.

Firstly there are the years of student loans that I need to pay off. I suppose I could follow in Thoreau's footsteps and find a wealthy benefactor to donate the land, but I am the suck at schmoozing. Though, I would love to see the business plan that sells that one. “So, you're going to collect a ragtag band of hippies, bikers, survivalists, farmers and doctors and build a settlement out in the boonies. What sort of profits are you expecting after you get started?”

Yeah. Better do this myself. Come on lotto!

Assuming I do manage to scrape up a place to homestead, I've often wondered how to go about it. And where. I've had long discussions on the subjects, as well as debating myself. Locally I'm fond of Traverse City, mostly due to a partiality to the landscape. Climate is iffy and soil is sandy. Move on.

Really, there are going to be positives and negatives to just about any local I can dream up. The north east has a cold climate and poor growing season. North west has a superior climate but is prone to earthquakes and volcanic activity. Fuck the South(east) – More eloquently, the climate is far too hot for my preference, and the last decades have been dry, not to mention the bevy of overly religious folk. Religious folk are scary enough in quiet times, I fear that the end of the world will send them over the edge. The southwest is hot, dry, and hot and dry.

I of course have my preference after weighing the options. No I won't tell you. I will however move onto the last part of this muddled tirade.

Housing. As I don't plan to wander, I will need some permanent housing. Something sturdy that works with the land. Many ideas have come and gone.

For a while, I had a passing fancy for Microhomes. For those who aren't enlightened, they're a spin off of the Thoreau inspired Movement for Simple Living. Thoreau himselflived in a Microhouse. Generally to be considered a microhouse the domicile needs to be around 100 to 750 square feet. That's right, many of these places are the size of a studio apartment. Some are as small as my dorm room. Still, that should be enough space for one or two people – so long as they Simplify and slough off their unnecessary baggage.

A microhouse would be perfect. I am a hermit and need but little space and could easily get by with a mere couple hundred square feet. Mostly. Even without the imminent Palinocalpyse. I want a home that will be warm in the winter and cool in the summer. All with the least resources possible. To be honest, I've been fascinated by the concept of the underground home since I was a kid. Back then we lived near an underground home and it was an exciting landmark that we would point out on the daily commute. I don't recall that seeing the place ever got old, it was so damned exotic.

Then I found Earthships. They are a range of earth sheltered homes that were constructed of walls of earth filled tires. The creator, a raging hippie, claims to have designed for sustainability. He's been working on the project for 30 or 40 years now, learning and advancing through trial and error. Heated with passive solar, they collect rainfall for water and are outfitted with sources to manufacture renewable energy(solar panels and wind turbines). He claims that even in the harshest Taos winters that residents don't need to spend a dime on heating the home. Same goes for cooling in the summers.

*Pardon if I'm a mite obsessed with the idea, but we just had a heatwave where the temps topped 105. There have been many days this summer where I've wished my apartment was really one of these structures.

The south face of the house is a wall of windows that forms a greenhouse. The roof collects water and stores it in cisterns. These two features are combined to make a natural water treatment system as well as food production area. Fresh water > Shower > Planters(to filter) > Toilet > Outdoor Planters > Septic tank and field.

Fresh food 365 days a year from the greenhouse. Resistant to fires, tornadoes and earthquakes. These are the claims that the hippie architect makes, and I want to believe them. The houses were designed to allow the inhabitants to live their lives off the grid. The possibilities tickle both the inner hermit and survivalist.

I want to try it out.

My half-assed adventure in Agriculture.

An update! How exciting!

The problem with writing an adventure blog, even ones that are rather lame, is that you need to actually go on adventures for material. Obviously, my definition of 'adventure' is rather broad in that I write about any experience that is new or at least unusual for me. Which is why I've been holding off on my half-assed adventure in going to the super-market, as that would sink into the realm of no-assed. If you've been reading along and paying any attention, it is likely that you've come to the conclusion that I am an exceedingly boring person.

Congratulations Captain Obvious.

Well, back to the adventures, and the general lack there of. Back in January of 2010, I quit a job that I hated and proceeded to delve into the ranks of the unemployed. I did this during a recession, with no other prospects lined up. Dumb, I know. I usually don't leap like that, and my reasons were stupid. But I still feel it was one of my best decisions.

August of 2010 saw me re-employed but worrying about the age of my car and replenishing some of my spent savings. March 2011 saw my job disappear once more. Yep, no more driving to Ann Arbor to drug mule for the ungrateful crazies, or the patients. Amid a steep incline in gas prices(currently up over $4.00 a gallon) All in all, it's been a light year for traveling and adventures.

So, I've not done much and I've traveled less. Not too much different from when times are good!

In short, to summarize my motives in a couple sentences: The apocalypse is coming. When it does I'm pretty sure that grocery stores will have long lines. I hate waiting in line.

I am fascinated by the self-sustained and self-reliant lifestyle. I would like to experiment with growing my own food and generally living off the land. Ideally, I would set up a studio to work making pottery. I'd like to take up black-smithing. And then sell my creations. All with my beautiful wives Rosario Dawson, Emma Watson and Cristina Hendricks. I'd like. I'd like. I'd like. Problem here is that I don't see a way to make this sustainable. Unless I went the hot robot wife route.

I call this Kicking it Thoreau Style. (The hooking up with three exceedingly hot movie stars aspect of the Walden Experiment was in one of the lost appendixes).

Anyhow, all of that rambling is to set up this simple statement. I planted a garden. This combines steps 1 through 3 in my mind. Step three isn't big profit. Actually, 'big profit' and 'farming' seem to be mutually exclusive. 'Bankruptcy and despair' seem to fall in line more with 'Farming' these days.

I've never grown vegetables before on my own initiative. My folks have put in a couple gardens when I was growing up(Between ten and fifteen years ago). My grand-parents grow their own vegetables. And supposedly I come from farming roots on my Mother's side. So, I've been exposed. But sitting back and watching is different than setting off on your own.

The first problem is of course, my lack of experience. Secondly, we live on the second floor of our house and don't have any land. That means the garden has gone into planters(buckets that came full of cat litter) and hiding behind windows. Great, we don't have to worry about wild birds and animals ganking our bounty. We just have the tame cats instead.
I've been contemplating this for a few months now actually. So hopefully it works out. If not? Well, then I've learned something along the way.

Step 1: Getting the supplies.



We went to Home Depot and spent at least an hour wandering around as I only had a rather fuzzy idea of what I wanted to 'accomplish' with this entire mess. Thus the Underpant Gnome reference. First there are the basics: Pots, soil and the like. The common denominator that every gardener needs to grow plants. We grabbed a 2.5 cubic foot bag of potting soil, which is a lot of dirt. We already had some containers that would work as pots.

All this leaves was deciding what kinds of food we wanted to attempt and grow. First on the list was a handful of herbs. Basil, Oregano, Thyme, Sage and Rosemary. Just a bit of Parsley short of a grand day at Scarborough Faire. For the actual veggies, we rocked with pole beans, snap peas, tomatoes, peppers, and finally lettuce. Yep, we're rocking for salad. Might make us healthier in the end. Or we'll have a lot of dead plants on our hands.

Step 2: Bringing all that shit home and hauling it upstairs. This is a step by itself.

Step 3: Plant garden. We opted for a mix of seeds and seedlings. Seedlings when we could get them, and pure seeds when we couldn't. I spent the morning transferring soil to the 'pots' and trying to recall what I remembered about transferring seedlings and planting seeds. It doesn't help that the instructions on the seed-packets were less than helpful. Or I TLDRed it before I got to the helpful part. What? The packets are bright and colorful and very distracting. And I got to play in the dirt, something I've been missing since graduating.

since we're indoors, and we have cats, we've needed to devise a way to keep the plants off the floor and get them closer to what little sunlight gets through the windows(eves really kill direct sunlight). This is my biggest worry, killing the plants with shade. Right now I've opted for an old bookshelf. Will need to modify it later. Good thing I have tools and little sense.

So ends part 1. According to the packets, There should be some movement on part of the sedds within two weeks.

Hercules Two: Clamation Boogaloo.

Adventures of Hercules
Lou Ferrigino

They made a sequel? Sweet Zombie Jesus, you have to be
kidding? Did they even watch the first movie before they slammed
down their cash to make the second? I thought not. Well
It's been two whole months, and then some, since I finished the Lou
Ferrigno Hercules movie. It took that long for the effects to
wear off and for me to recover from the shock. Unlike the first
movie, I managed to watch the entire thing without using the fast
forward button once. Like the first one, I had to turn the beast
off for a day and come back to it. It made my brain hurt.

Where to start. Well this movie seems to have been made by the
exact same people in the exact same style as the last. Same
cheesy 'special effects', same crap-tastic costuming, hell it even had
the same actors and the same freaking villain! I kid thee not,
the same actor playing the same villain. They resurrected the bad
guy, because he was oh so tough, you know with all the dieing he
managed to do in the end, and they used him again. Yeah, be
afraid Herc, be very afraid.

That's right. They resurrected King Minos, the evil user of
science, to fight against the power of the vaguely benevolent Gods and
the natural order of the universe. Was this movie funded by the
Roman Catholic church? I mean really, evil science? Science
the cause of chaos? In the end Minos didn't get any wicked ass
gizmos in which to battle the other bad guys with, he gets magic eye
beams, and a magic flaming sword. Make up your minds damn
it. is he supposed to be using a kick ass orbital death-ray
launched by the evil United States, or is he using the evil black
magic, invented by the United States? One or the other please.

Well the second movie actually seems to follow a plot that is at times
nearly makes sense. Well the story goes that Zeus' six magic
thunderbolts of something or other were stolen by some rebellious
goddesses led by Hera. These disaffected Hippies, thought to
gain, I'm not quite sure why they did it, but they did it anyway.
Well, yeah that's great, the thunderbolts are missing, the world is in
danger, send the Hercster to the rescue!

Well first of all, before all that started, some evil priests were
sacrificing a scantily clad babe to some god or demon of fire.
Two other scantily clad babes watch the goings on, and decide that they
don't like what they see, so they go for help. They consult a
pair psychedelic butterfly women, who tell them they need the help of
Hercules, and they'll find him in the forbidden valley. Just a
note, there's always a forbidden valley it seems in fantasy movies, and
the valley is forbidden for a very good reason. People in these
movies never seem to remember this fact.

Well The Herc gets to earth. The first thing he runs into is a
creature that I suppose is a werewolf, only it looks more like a
Greying cousin It from the Adams family, who happens to be wearing a
cheap baboon mask, with some dog-like sound effects added on top.
I'm not making this up, nor do I wish I were capable of making
something like this up. Brain Damage! Sadly the rest of the
movie doesn't get any better.

Once again to the so called special effects. The costumes are
cheap, both for the main human characters and for the monsters that
they fight. Some of the monsters use animation techniques.
Not that fancy-schmancy computer stuff, but the old fashioned
way. So old fashioned it seems, that they felt that they were
making it up as they went along. The stop-motion claymation that
they made use of, was out-done by such 1950s and 1960s fare as the
Sinbad films and Jason and the Argonots, not to mention Clash of the
Titians. No, it seemed more like a bad Gumby short at
times. The rest of the animation was just simplistic color,
bright primary hues mostly. Flat and boring.

Oh, I can't forget my favorite part of the movie, the Amazons fight
scene. Chicks with guns kick ass. It is a proven
fact. Much ass is kicked by chicks with guns. I cannot
reiterate this enough. Imagine my surprise and delight when the
Amazons were about to attack. And then disappointment when I
discovered it was just a bunch of men in drag. That's right kids,
rather than getting real amazon like women, they just dressed men up in
drag, gave them fake breasts and everything, and then dubbed it all
over with womens voices. No wonder the Amazons lost, not only
were they poseurs, they were also a group of confused young men.

Then there were the absolutely confusing aspects of the movie.
Zeus, at one point, confronts his arch nemesis chaos. I shall now
recreate the scene for you...

Chaos-chick: We're a lot alike you know, we balance things
between us?

Zeus: Oh yeah? Well poopy head, I gots me the time on my
side baby!

*A giant animated skull comes down and zaps her with a death-ray*

Zeus: Eat it clown!

I don't get it either. It seemed random, like it was added simply
for the chance to let their effects crew draw a giant skull and then
have it attack someone. The entire movie was like that. It
also went along with the first flick in it's blatant attempts to
butcher the original classical mythology. Though at least this time
there weren't any giant robots to fight against. The movie did
make a fair attempt at destroying my sanity and giving me epileptic
seizures. Why did I pay money for this crap?

The worst part is, I have failed to learn my lesson and keep watching crappy movies.

So I plan to survive the apocalypse. Despite all the odds against me making it. But I've been a fan of the genre in general for far too long to believe myself anything other than woefully ignorant of the mundane tasks of day to day life after the end. I mean really, I'm totally out of it when it comes to building a McGyver like trap to take out the last of those bastard biker nomads who just murdered my beloved wife and child. I'll need a wife first. Any takers?

I'd like to take up sailing. Windpower is unlimited, if a bit unpredictable. And the world's surface is covered with water, at around 70%. Plus, and this is important, frakking zombies can't swim. Ok, the buggery tradition of the open ocean isn't so overly appealing, but then sometimes you just need to live by the unwritten book of the sea. Not just the sailing, but the entire survival at sea class of skills, from navigation to gathering food and facing storms.

Next, I'll need to learn how to enjoy fish and other seafood. I hate fish. And I'll probably be living off it for a while. Unless there's some genetic revolution in the meantime and seacows are created. In that case, fuck the Tuna Surprise Jeeves, I'll have the steak. Scientific establishment, get on that would you?

There will probably be other survivors, and life on the move is rather lonely so I really need to work on some better pickup lines. Though accurate(hopefully), I imagine that "I'm neither radioactive or undead! Do me!" Will fail to bring in the honeys for very long. Specially after the other male survivors pick up on those magic words. Eventually I'll need to admit that I just can't compete with the three eyed mutant who can say (and prove) I've got a six inch tongue and can breathe through my ears.

I'm not going for some McGyveresque feat of "I've taken this box of rubber bands, this ballpoint pen and a bag full of baking soda and built a nuclear powered air craft carrier. What'd you do?" No, I'd settle with being able to open the hood of a vehicle and not saying "Gee-willikers, there are a lot of hoses and stuff. looks Like we're walking buddy."

Run a still and make a decent vintage(one that doesn't make the imbiber blind). I don't touch the stuff, and will likely be less interested when I see what goes into the process. But folks do like their liquor and they might be willing to trade. Keep that eye on the brass ring. Remember on you way out to try some Suttonstein's 3 hour special brew - It probably won't make you crazy.

Blacksmithing. Not so much for the weapons/tools/art, but more for the bulging muscles. It'll also give me some affinity for the warhammer.

Land navigation and wilderness survival. If I don't take to the sea I'm hitting the mountains. Which means I have to get to the mountains. And then not die of gross stupidity (I'm betting against myself on this one). It's unlikely that I'll stumble on a goodwilled ole'timey trapper type who will take me under his wing and teach me everything I need after the fact. Nope, gotta be proactive here. I plan to spend the next week or so watching and re-watching Jeremiah Johnson.

Aikido. Nuff said.

Playing gameboy without throwing it when I lose my temper after the fiftieth time in a row where the damn game cheats and I magically get hit and die right before I beat the last boss again, fucking god damn it why does that happen every time who the hell programmed this shit-fest they call a game. Best Buys might be few and far between.

Gardening. Assuming that I live to a ripe old age. Gardening is what old retired people do. I like to leave my options open. Besides how freaky would it be to one day happen on a random plot of land out in the middle of nowhere where a crazy old dude is growing petunias?

Free-style running/parkour. What the hell would be cooler than a post apocalyptic event with a parkour style chase? Imagine my bad self, clad in football shoulder pads and chaps, running through what's left of Paris as a gang of biker nomad mimes try and hunt me down after brutally killing my wife and child. of course there are too many to Aikido and I have no ammunition left (wasted it on the first gang of biker nomads - fuckers) so I have to parkour my ass out of there to lick my wounds and come back and get them with my pointed stick of vengance.

Skill 16, manufacture of kickass pointed sticks.

Knitting. So, after I broke my leg from a misstep whilst parkouring away from some rather savage looking midgets, I'll really need to be able to form a rope and climb the hell down the rest of the cliff so that I don't have to go over the waterfall. I'll just need to remember to keep a pair of long needles with me.

Exotic dance. You never know when it might come in handy.

There are probably more. But I think I have all the major ones.