We Hate Zombies

Scenario:
It’s Thursday and you’ve been dreaming of fried chicken all week. Your refrigerator is empty, especially of fried chicken, but also of other things you might be able to substitute for fried chicken, like fried turkey. The only answer? Wal-Mart, with their delicious buckets of fried chicken, not sold everywhere, but sold somewhere, and it’s a very delicious somewhere. Now you’re there, with over two pounds of hot chicken in a convenient bucket, wandering the aisles of food and beverage, munching on chicken poppers and barbecued boneless wings. It’s heaven. You start to throw back a gallon of milk you haven’t paid for when you hear screaming coming from the front. Goddamn zombies just won’t leave a man alone, chicken or not. What do you do?

What you should do:
Luckily, you’re at Wal-Mart. Unfortunately, you’re at Wal-Mart. If you don’t know what Wal-Mart is or what they have, I don’t really know where you’ve been or why I’m “talking” to you.¹ But, since you’re here, Wal-Mart sells just about everything, and dirt cheap too. Everything would include guns, knives, lawn mowers, chains, and everything else you would need to build a make-shift arsenal fit to arm an army of soccer moms. The bad part is where the soccer moms come in, because soccer moms are by definition more likely to ban toys with sharp edges than pick up a gun and defend their livelihood.

No, soccer moms will be what makes this scenario dangerous. They’re going to try and help the apparent victim, and they will lose fingers and scream and probably cry a lot. Then they will be infected. Of those that aren’t out-right infected by a misplaced gesture of kindness, their heads will explode as they try to grasp the zombification rocking out in front of their eyes between the racks of clearance clothes and apple sauce. People with exploded heads are useless to you.

If you can, stop people from moving toward the front. The more people you can save now, the easier it is to get back to fried chicken later. People will be curious, so make up a story about what you did or didn’t see and tell them the place is being robbed. Tell them you need to “Take America Back!” and lead them toward the hardware section. Grab rakes and shovels, grab chains, lighter fluid, a box of matches, and motor oil, then head over to the sports section to load up on guns and ammo. Employees might try to stop you; you don’t have time to shoot craps with employees, so take ‘em out if you can’t take ‘em with you.

Do not try and hunt zombies throughout the store. With so many corners, so many blind spots, it’d be the dumbest thing you could do. Instead, you’re going to lay a trap. Hopefully you have some help with you at this point, and hopefully their heads haven’t exploded because I’m sure people are starting to see that dead people aren’t quite dead yet. Use the guns to cover your ass while you rope off the end of an aisle with the chains. Make it hard to get through, but not so hard it’d hold you back. Post some gunners behind the chains to cover the escape route.

Pour the motor oil out on the floor near the opening of the aisle; then become the bait and attract attention. When the zombies come slipping and sliding toward you, slip out through the chains, leaving the zombies snared in your trap. That’s when you set fire to the whole place and watch the make-shift oven cook up a meal for the vultures. End it all by grabbing your fried chicken and booking it out the door.

What I would do:
Another thing Wal-Mart has is disabled people, and disabled people need motorized wheel-chairs to shop (of course!). Also, did I mention Wal-Mart sells lawn-mowers? I’m sure you can see where I’m headed with this. I’d scissor-kick a passenger out of his seat and jack the nearest powered wheel-chair, then speed off toward the Outdoors section. Grabbing the biggest lawn-mower on the shelves, I’d attached it to the front of my cart, blade out. I’d top it all off with a clear plastic tarp to act as a blood-shield, then drive leisurely around the store, literally mowing down the weeds encroaching upon the vibrant blood of humanity. Would it be messy? Oh hell yes; there would be more gore than watching Dead-Alive on an IMAX movie screen, and it would be awesome.

Of course, with blood and guts, you just can’t rinse that stuff off. Some people have pointed out my penchant for burning things, but we should let facts speak for themselves. “The best way to eradicate infectious blood and guts is to burn it away,” said The Facts. And you don’t argue with The Facts. Here’s another one. I once met Chuck Norris and immediately engaged him in an impromptu staring contest. The rise in man-heat melted the pavement, but through the thinly veiled sexual overtones, Chuck and I stared at each other for 40 days and 40 nights, upon which he clapped me on the shoulder and said, “You’re a tough son of a bitch.” Not wanting to admit defeat, we each started walking backward until the other was out of sight.² I haven’t blinked since because I know that somewhere, Chuck is waiting.

¹ See the quotes around ‘talking’? It’s because I’m not actually in the your room holding your hand through this scenario. I just wanted to be accurate, just in case you were confused.
² It has been reported that Chuck Norris has 20/0.025 vision. Before I was out of sight, he had to walk so far backward that he crossed an ocean. He’s listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the only man to surpass both Michael Jackson and Jesus by moonwalking across the Atlantic ocean.

Scenario:
You’re attending a Halloween party at your old college friend’s house. You decided that Dracula would be a cool costume and it wouldn’t be too hard to make, but decided at the last minute to go as a pussy. On your way to Walgreens to get some vampire teeth, you come across a small group of zombies, thirsting for human flesh. What do you do?

What you should do:

Develop an action plan. Being Halloween, you have to make sure that some dunderheads aren’t dressed up as zombies just to push your buttons. They really have no idea what is going on here, and they may already have sealed there fate. The only thing that can save them is an action plan (assuming you don’t wet your pants and run to dairy queen crying).

Determine if they are human. One person offered a simple test for old people that should apply here. Catch their attention and wave at them. If they fail to wave, they are either a zombie or an asshole which are both acceptable reasons for termination. If they do wave, they are passable as human beings, which I cannot completely condone.

If they wave back, simple protocol is to steal their candy and run to Walgreens. If they follow you in, pull a gun and start screaming at them (’Don’t you fucking dare!!!!!’ Usually works well). If they don’t follow you, you just scored some candy. If they don’t wave back, dispatch them as you see fit. If nothing comes to mind, send up the Geoffrey signal. Everyone will die, but you’ll be a hero. A dead hero but a hero nonetheless.

What I would do:
IZRM. Too bad kiddies. Blame your parents for what happened. The people on the news will claim that a bomb went off and there were no survivors. Only jelly and fingernails were found at the scene. Oh yeah, and I’d be there with that look on my face. You know the one. The one that says, “Uhhh…. I dunno.” Hahahah. Ohhhh geez (wipes tears from my eyes). Yeah, that’s how it usually goes.

Scenario:
It’s deer hunting season, and you’ve braved the weather and the trigger-happy hillbillies so you can get back to your roots and kill some nature.  Well, part of killing nature’s most herbalicious is sitting around in trees like a monkey, drinking beer like a German, and occassionally talk small cat-naps.  Well, you’ve hit a triple and stole home, which basically means you passed out in your little tree house vomiting 12 feet above the ground.  Normally I’d pat you on the back and say good job, but you just woke up and much to everyone’s surprise, there’s a deer right below you.  And a thousand zombies.  What do you do?

What you should do:
Well that’s what you get for sleeping on the job, drinking so much your IZRM fails to kick in until your fate is practically sealed.  Had you awoken at the first crack of a twig or rustle of leaves, you would have been able to pick off the zombie or two with your hunting rifle, then make your escape before you were sealed in with a sea of cold pallid flesh.  That’s what you should have done, but no, now it’s too late; you’ve gone and made it difficult for yourself.  Idiot.

Your best bet now is that all those zombies were only a few other hapless people who were caught unawares.  City and country folk alike can be taken down by the undead menace, so if you’re of the country, don’t think you have some sort of mumbo-jumbo immunity to zombiism or stupidity.  With that in mind, we’re hoping that the hillbillies haven’t succumbed to the deathless ways and are still holding on to the shotguns they were born with.  They’ll know how to handle an intruder, and it won’t be with a toy poodle.

Since they know what season it is, hunters and hillbillies alike won’t be able to resist checking out your score.  Did you score?  Not today, but it doesn’t matter.  Shoot the deer if you want, but that doesn’t matter either.  You just have to sound like you’ve killed a forty point buck.  Hoop, holler, shoot some bullets into the sky (because you know those bullets won’t save you unless you save one for yourself).  Attract enough attention, and you’ll draw enough armed people to mow down a small country.  Which they will.

What I would do:
Ever hear of the National Wild Turkey Federation?  Me neither, not till they banned me from competition, for life, after summoning the sheer power of twenty thousand wild turkeys down upon a small turkey-calling competition outside of a town I like to call Nevada.  And that was just my warm-up.  What’s a few deaths and several million dollars in damage to a man who’s just won a turkey calling competition?  Not much, and I would know.

What’s this have to do with anything related to zombies?  One, it shows how awesome I am at anything I do.  Two, it’s my way out, my escape plan, my backdoor through Death’s backyard.  Remember how Gandalf escaped from the roof of the evil Saruman’s tower?  He talked to some kind of moth thing, which brought some kind of griffin or super-sized eagle bird thing, and he jumped on the back of that bird and took the last train out of Dodge.  Well, what’s a couple truck-sized birds compared to 10 million chickens and turkeys?

With my earth-shattering bird call, I’ll draw the attention of so much out-of-season bird-meat that the zombies will be swamped with avian allies.  Then I’ll use twigs and leaves to fashion a harness tied to 50 turkeys, and those great birds will fly (but not far) and drag me out of danger, away from the zombies.  Eat that Captain Jack.  The final step will be to convince the military that terrorists are plotting a vicous attack against our food supply by making rain and destroying levees.  Nothin smells like napalm in the morning.

Scenario:
You’re an old person and you have bad credit. AHHHH!!!!! But seriously, AHHHHHHH!!!!!! Anywho, you’re out trying to find a new refrigerator. Apparently, trying to keep forty-two gallons of prune juice cold in the dead heat of August was too much for your previous effort, so you need something with a little beef to it. You open up the largest fridge you find. As a sales pitch, the staff kept an entire zombie frozen solid in the freezer portion of the fridge. Unfortunately, you’re old and the zombie thawed out before you could decide what to do (and move to do it).

What you should do:
AHHHHHH, old people! As an older American, you must get away quickly. If anyone in the near area has a IZRM, you will fall in the reaction. Unfortunately, that old football injury is acting up and quick movements are all but impossible. You’ll need to get on a Segway and get on one quick. While scooting away in style, blow your zombie whistle (if you don’t have one, get one).

Zombie whistles were created by aliens as a weapon to combat zombiism quickly. The whistle causes a zombie to remain immobile while the tune plays. The aliens first gave them to Jesus and Moses, two Mexican brothers completely unrelated to anything religious. The two brothers were deeply religious and believed that the whistles were given to them by God. Because of the confusion, God got angry at them for worshipping a false God, and forces them to eat each other. They both started at the other’s foot and continued eating until they both disappeared and that is how the Chihuahua was created. Some believe that the whistles were redistributed throughout the family, but you might find them on eBay.

If you wreck your Segway before an observant zombie killer can dispatch the abomination, I hope a washing machine falls on you and you die.

What I would do:
I wouldn’t be old, for starters. That aside, I would definitely use a little technique I like to call, “lemon drops in the afternoon sun.” To successfully pull this off, you need a healthy supply of marbles, boiling water, salt, a stock pot, rope and a screen. Luckily, I keep all these things on me at all times, which is ideal.

To start, I have to put the boiling water and the salt in the stock pot. This allows the water to get hotter and not spill everywhere. Take the screen and wrap it around the marbles and tie the rope to the end. Drop the sack in the water. Watch for splashing because it can sting. Once the screen begins to glow red, its time.

Since I am faster than an old person, the zombie is still partially frozen by the time the marbles are ready. I have to pull the sack out and begin spinning it above my head, as if I were a cowboy. After reaching a top speed of 1200 rpm, catapult the sack toward the zombie. Just as the rope is running out of length, pull it back with the force of 1200 mules (see the symmetry here??). This will force the hot marbles through the red hot screen, creating a million tiny, red hot, zombie-killing bullets. The mixture of cold zombie and hot swarm of marble shards creates a phenomenon known as pink mist. It is rare but beautiful. If the sun catches the pink mist at 12:00 noon, it creates a leprechaun with 1200 pieces of gold in his pot-o-gold. Nobody ever expects that.

Scenario:
At some point during the past week or month or who knows how long, you blacked out. You’ve just come to and find yourself sitting in the midst of a large group of people, watching some great debacle of color in what looks to be a huge, dimly lit tent. You realize from the clowns and the trapeze ninjas that you’re at a circus, and no one else has a splitting headache but you. That’s when you see the zombie wobble in through the front tent flaps and take the neck out of a guy. You reach for your shotgun but find only a hunting knife. What do you do?

What you should do:
In order to respond to this scenario, you’ll have to understand a little about the mob mentality. When people catch on to the gory zombie glee going on near the entrance, they’re going to go bat shit nuts and run for Jesus. Everyone will panic and do what they can as quickly as they can to move toward what they perceive to be an escape. Problem is, some people are clumsy and fall, some people are ruthless and throw elbows, and everyone generally moves at a different pace. The result? Chaos, confusion, and a hot sweaty traffic jam; a man-buffet, ripe for the infectious blood vomit.

In the jumble of limbs, the zombie will have plenty of time to take a nibble here and there, until the zombiism is spreading as fast as fire in a furniture store. You don’t want to be caught down in that crap because you hate people rubbing their sweat all over you, and your knife won’t protect you from a thousand zombies already rubbing you the wrong way. That’s why you’re going to be smart and avoid the mob.

Instead of running down the stands to join the death sentence below, move upwards, towards the top. There will be very few people at the top, so you won’t be bothered by Strangers you may or may not hate.¹ Also, the zombie will be distracted by the mass of people, and even when zombies start to head your way they will probably be even slower to advance due to their general inability to scale a set of stairs.² Even better, you’ll have a bird’s eye view to watch the madness or otherwise check it’s progress.

That just leaves you with the escape part. Well, it’s a good thing you brought your knife, because if you hadn’t noticed your cage is nothing more than some heavy-duty fabric. Since you’re at the top of the stands, you should be at the wall of the tent, so use the knife to slash your own exit. Now, you’ll probably be at least 40 feet up in the air, so don’t haul ass skydiving because you’ll never walk away clean. Instead, cheap the ground for zombies, then climb out of the tent. Use the knife to slow your descent as you slide your way down to the ground.

What I would do:
Since I’m always watching for zombies, blacked out or not, I spotted the zombie before it even knew what a second chin tasted like. The quick observation buys me precious time. Before anyone else would even have a chance to recover from the shock of a man bleeding out, I would have vaulted over the heads of a hundred men down to the main attraction. Every circus has a clown and a cannon, so I’d use both in a maneuver I like to call ‘Keeping the Bull off the Cowboy.’ Shooting the confused and abused clown out of the cannon and into the zombies would keep the macabre at the entrance and slow their advance for only the cost of a creepy vintage funny man.³

With the zombies busy feasting on number three, I would duck and roll over to the lion tamer and cut his Achilles heel so I could steal his whip. The lions, as their kind has been known to do, would grow wild at the scent of blood and devour the weakness, then naturally fall in behind their new ring leader. With whip in hand, I would approach the three zombies, whipping them from 20 feet like the real Indiana Jones from when his movies were good. First I would take out their eyes. Whip! Whip! Then I would knock out their teeth. Whip! Crack!

After rendering the zombies helpless, I would likely be attacked by circus folk seeking revenge for the loss of their old whip-master. This would of course be a minor annoyance as I would unleash my ferocious man-eaters on them. The carnies’ thirst for vengeance would only whet the appetite of my four-legged bodyguards, so some innocent bystanders might also be consumed, as could be expected. Free from distractions of my own, I would continue whipping at the blind toothless undead until I had backed them into the elephants cage and locked the door. Then I would continue whipping the zombies through the bars of the cage while the fire-breather set ‘em alight, just to build up a thirst for the heavy drinking I would be about to receive.
¹ Xenophobia: curse, or gift?
² Note: Some types of zombies are not slowed by stairs. Watch out for this.
³ I don’t fear carnies, but they smell like cabbage and that reminds me of my grandma and her freakishly small hands.^4
4 Turns out my grandma died before I was born. No one knows who that old woman was or why I went to her house for two hours twice a week.