Haven’t done a zombie apocalypse prep post in a while. So here we go. Yahoo had an article the other day on purchasing anti-zombie strongholds. These are actual living spaces that might serve you well in a zombie outbreak. Some better than others. Not sure it’s actually a good idea to have an underground place unless you’ve got an escape tunnel elsewhere. After all, if you’re underground and zombies figure it out, they’ll just congregate over your bunker. So if you go that route, have an escape tunnel or two that are reinforced and camouflaged.
Saturday and I felt like doing some more zombie apocalypse survival tips. In kind of a roundabout way.
I have this list. On it are the names of people I definitely do not ever want to be around in event of a zombie apocalypse (or any other kind of major freak-out). It doesn’t include, say, political people or celebrities because chances are, in an event like that, I won’t be anywhere near Tom Cruise or Kate Beckinsale or the president. Chances are, I’ll be having to pick my allies (or not) from the nearest neighbors, especially if I’m not near any close friends or family members.
So this list has the names of people I actually know who I do not want anywhere near me should serious s*** go down.
Haven’t blogged about zombies in a while. I was traveling last weekend and I ended up reading the first 2 of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy. I put that off, like, as long as I could so I wouldn’t be all part of the trend or something, but I read ’em and posted my thoughts over on my Goodreads account. So if you’re on Goodreads, you can go check out my thoughts over there. Fave character in that series thus far is, hands down, Lisbeth Salander. A woman I definitely would not want to be friends with, but also one I wouldn’t want to be enemies with and someone I’d hire in a heartbeat to track someone down.
Anyway, let’s chat about things to do and not to do during a zombie apocalypse. First and foremost, people, I think we just really need to get this out on the table: SEX.
Hi, folks. OMG it is that time of year again. I blogged about it yesterday. Catch it here.
I am so going to a costume party tonight. I hope all of you are, as well and I hope you all dress up and have a freakin’ BLAST.
In the meantime, someone passed this link along to me, and I was woefully unaware of this site. ZOMBIESQUAD! WOOOOO! You can catch them at this link. The team bills themselves thus:
Zombie Squad is an elite zombie suppression task force ready to defend your neighborhood from the shambling hordes of the walking dead. We provide trained, motivated, skilled zombie extermination professionals and zombie survival consultants. Our people and our training are the best in the industry.
But they point out that when there aren’t hordes of the living dead filling city streets, they do this:
When the zombie removal business is slow we focus our efforts towards educating ourselves and our community about the importance of disaster preparation. If you are prepared for zombies, you’re prepared for anything.
To satisfy this goal we host disaster relief charity fundraisers, disaster preparation seminars and volunteer our time towards emergency response agencies.
You, too, can get involved. Go to the website (and the groovy link I provided above) and click on “chapters.” You’ll see it on the left-hand side of the page. It’s a philanthropic, educational organization with a great sense of the macabre. And who DOESN’T want to be prepared for a zombie outbreak? I ask you! Who doesn’t? They’re taking applications for membership now, so if you’re interested, check it out. Learn how to survive an outbreak, and also how to be just prepared in general for disasters, whether natural or unnatural. and learn how to do community work around those issues.
Awesome.
All rightie! Happy Saturday, and happy hallow-days!
Hey, kids! Getting ready for tomorrow’s premiere of Walking Dead on AMC! I assume this means YOU are, too! But getting ready for a TV show is a heck of a lot easier than getting ready for an actual zombie apocalypse (duh) because, in most instances, people DON’T prepare for any kind of apocalypse, let alone zombies.
I mean, there are those among us who do prepare for some kind of apocalypse. What the means is they usually stock food, medical supplies, and guns and ammo. This is not a bad idea, but it also precludes mobility, and that may be one of the options that you have to exercise.
At this point, I defer to Max Brooks, who is surely the zombie mas-tah with regard to today’s tip. What I’ll talk about today is how to recognize that there might be a zombie outbreak in your area and to assess what, if anything, anybody’s doing about it. You can find this in his excellent Zombie Survival Guide.
Whew. A busy week. Hope everyone’s going to have a great Labor Day Weekend! And if you’re part of the contingent out there along the Gulf Coast of in the Crescent City who thought “oh, cool! Beach weekend!”, well, bummer. Tropical Storm Lee, as you no doubt have already found out, is bringing tons of rain. And then the storm will move northeast, so Texas and Oklahoma won’t get any of that much-needed rain. Dang. For those of you in the path of Lee, stay safe.
And speaking of storms, if you can help in the clean-up of Hurricane Irene, here’s a list of organizations accepting donations. Please share it far and wide, because these organizations are not only helping with Irene, but they help all kinds of people following all kinds of disasters all over. Thanks.
Moving along. It’s Saturday, and time now for a zombie (or other) apocalypse survival tip. This one is one you might want to start putting into play long before any sort of apocalyptic event, however. It has to do with adding to your skillz box.
Yesterday I was thinking about trains. I was thinking that I sure wish this country had a better (and high-speed) train system, because I love traveling by train. I like getting up and walking around in a train, and going to the snack bar and watching the landscape fly past out the windows. Love that. We here in the States are deprived of super awesome train travel. Not to diss on Amtrak, or anything, but seriously. We need more tracks, more trains, and we’d be able to get around this country a lot easier, I think.
Anyway, I’m getting to something, here. Seriously. Bear with me.
Yesterday I posted an excerpt from a work in progress over at my other hangout, Women and Words. It’s the third chapter of a F/F romance I’m working on (WHUUUUUT? Andi writes novel-length romance??? Dunno yet–giving it a try). You’ll also find links at that post to the first 2 chapters, so have no fear, I’m not forcing you to hunt for ’em! So go on and clickie that linkie up there to have a looksee, if you’re in the mood.
Moving along…
Howsabout some post-apocalyptic vehicles? The only problem I can foresee here is fuel, but perhaps some intrepid inventor somewhere is working on getting one of these up and running on something other than fuel.
Although the EM-50 Urban Assault Vehicle is the shizzle, too. Did you see the movie Stripes? If not, get it. You’ll see the EM-50 in action. source
These vehicles are “post-apocalyptic,” which could be any kind of apocalypse, including zombies. And yes, the link mentions zombies, so clearly, some of these vehicles can help with that, if you’re fortunate enough to have one and if fuel isn’t that big a deal acquiring.
All rightie, happy reading, happy writing, happy Saturday!
I was thinking this morning that one doesn’t need to be undead to be a “zombie.”
Specifically, I’m thinking here of that awesome zombie flick Shaun of the Dead (2004), which if you dig a little deeper under the surface is kind of a metaphor about how if you’re not careful, living can actually suck the life out of you, and not in a good way. You wake up, you go to a soul-draining job that you’re not totally happy about, you go home. The next day, you wash, rinse, repeat.
In the movie, there’s the scene where Shaun wakes up the morning after the zombie-fication starts, and he’s not entirely awake, but he wanders down to the corner store where he usually buys a paper and a drink or a snack and already, the audience can tell there are zombies about, but he doesn’t make the connection that something’s freaky, even freakier than the night before when he and his buddy were at the pub, doesn’t notice that there’s a bloody handprint on the door of the cooler he opens to get his drink, doesn’t think it too weird that the clerk at the store is missing and the store’s kind of a mess. Shaun just leaves his money on the counter and goes back home, oblivious to the people wandering aimlessly around the street or some of the destruction.
Here’s a good compilation somebody did that juxtaposes Shaun going to the store when things were normal, and when things weren’t. He doesn’t seem to notice much…
Point being that you can actually be a zombie without being undead, that your life can actually kind of drift along, you stuck in a job you hate, doing the same things over and over again, until before you know it, you’re so locked in you don’t even notice that an actual zombie apocalypse is under way because your synapses have been dulled by the anesthetized life you’ve been living.
So here’s your zombie survival tip for today: if you find that you are already living a zombie existence as I’ve described here, it might be time to try to make some changes. Get a new hobby. Play some sports (the physical conditioning will serve you well in an actual zombie apocalypse). Take some drives in the country. If you have access to awesome public transportation, go to neighborhoods in your city you don’t normally visit. If you’re in this country, take an Amtrak trip somewhere you’ve never been. If you’re in Europe, take a train somewhere you’ve never been. You’ve got to get past the zombie-fication that every day life can lead you to, so you can be sharper for the rest of your life (whether or not a zombie apocalypse occurs). You need a new perspective, mates. Go get one!
Remember, I’ve already posted on how guns might be a good idea for back-up, but keep in mind the downside. You’re gonna need to keep finding ammo; they’re loud and might attract attention from more zombies and other survivors who want your guns; you have to keep them clean and serviceable if you want ’em to work correctly.
Again, they might not be a bad idea in a pinch. But true survivors like to increase the odds of their survival. Which means
1. avoiding potential confrontations with zombies and/or other survivors
2. staying on the move — the fewer people in an area originally, the fewer zombies
3. firing a gun as few times as possible in order to remain on the down-low
So if possible, get yourself a baseball bat (for our friends in non-baseball-playing countries, a cricket bat is quite nice). One that is easy for you to wield and stash. And you might consider getting yourself a lightweight plastic face shield. If you see some trouble headed your way of the zombie variety and it’s a lone individual or maybe a couple and there’s no way to kind of sneak away, get your gloves and faceshield on and…
Again, I’m not suggesting that you go zombie hunting armed this way. But it’s always good to have a bat and faceshield at the ready should you be confronted by an individual zombie or perhaps 2. Three, and I’d suggest finding a way to not be there anymore, drawing as little attention as possible.
Attack ’em if you have no other options or if that’s the absolute best one. A bat at least gives you reach, and it won’t get stuck in a zombie like an axe or a pick or something like that. Gads, that’s a disgusting thought.
Andi Marquette 