We Hate Zombies

Scenario:
It is late summer. The air is stagnate and boiling hot. Your field hasn’t seen a drop of rain in about a month. The corn is underdeveloped but completely dried out and ready to harvest. You are out in the field taking samples to make sure it isn’t too soon, or too late. You are about to take a break and smoke your tobacco pipe when you hear a faint rustling in the corn a few rows over. What could it be? Your wife died last year from the cancer and Ruddy, your brown lab, died ten years ago when he got kicked by the horse. The kids have all moved out and you don’t have any friends. It can be only one thing. Zombies! What do you do?

What you should do:
You’ve been farming this land your whole life so you know where you are and where you can run, but the zombies have the advantage. They just have to follow you and you don’t know where they could be hiding. You can’t see far in the corn across the rows, so you need to run down the row that you are in. You can see all the way up and down the row so you only have to worry about a zombie flanking you on your way out.

But which way do you go? Do you head back to the house where the zombies could find other people to attack or do you head farther out into the fields? Heading home would give you more tools to dispatch the zombies, so you should head that way, despite the danger to other people. Remember, you don’t have any friends, so if they get bite, just finish them off with your chainsaw.

Once you make it out of the corn, grab your rifle and pick them off as they saunter out of the fields. Hopefully you get them all, but you’ll never know.

What I would do:
Above all else, I am a zombie hunter. I am not a farmer, a brother, or a human. Keeping that in mind, I want to make sure that I get every last one of those bastards. Making the assumption that the zombies are all in the corn field, I only have one option. Light a match and watch the mother fucker burn.

But how do I make sure that I get them all and that they don’t escape the flames by going the opposite way? Well, it is simple. I have to start the flames toward one of the corners of the field that I am in. Since the zombies are likely to blindly follow me around until they catch me or they die, I will stay in the field and continue to light the corn in various places. The eventual goal is to spiral toward the center of the field so that they corn is burning in all directions and the zombies are trapped. Since the corn is dry as week old dog shit, it should burn pretty damn fast. Then all I have to do is sit and wait.

Why kill yourself brave zombie hunter? Considering that I am an old man with nobody to spend my life with and I just burned my entire years work (and paycheck), it really does seem like the easy way out. And, if I get all of the zombies in one shot, what better way to go down? I could live out the rest of my life and eventually die of liver failure, on account of the drinking, or I could sit in the middle of a burning cornfield, all zenlike and shit, while a horde of zombies closes in on me just as the fire closes in on them. It is like choosing between a bratwurst and cow penis: the choice is clear.

Scenario:
Your local grocery store is having a sale

I want your job!

on big boy Bud Lite cans at one dollar each, limit one thousand per visit. This is the sale of the century. When you get up to the counter with a cartload of treasure, you realize that you only have twenty bucks on you and your credit card is already maxed. In a panic, you shoot the clerk in the heart, take the twenty and the beer and hit the road. As you run down the street, the clerk is hot on your heels and he doesn’t look like he is coming for the money. What do you do?

What you should do:
Turn around and shoot him in the head. The man is obviously a zombie now and you cannot remember him for what he was. Wait a minute. You just shot the man in the heart while he was alive. What is the hold up?

Oh, you are out of bullets. That is a problem. Can you outrun the clerk? No, he is gaining on you. No more ammo, huh? Run into the street and start dodging traffic. The zombie clerk will be too interested in you to watch for speeding cars and buses.

This is me. I am winning. You are probably killed by me.

The longer you run in traffic the better your chances of surviving are.

What I would do:
Believe it or not, I wouldn’t have a maxed out credit card so I could pay for all the booze with it, even if I was out of cash. I would drink the beers and buy some more ammo. Life is simpler that way and so is killing zombies. This way, the only surprise is the happy ending down at the Tokyo Spa. God bless America.

Scenario:
Well, it’s tax time again and you know what that means. It’s time to head down to your local H&R Block or go to WalMart to get a copy of this year’s Tax Cut, Federal and State. You’ve got to get all of those important tax related documents ready for action and prepare for a bigfederal punch in the stomach. For those unlucky few, it is time for a date with the IRS. What do you do?

What you should do:
Listen carefully. This isn’t a post about killing zombies. It is about not killing humans who resemble zombies. The IRS is a bad place that spawn some evil, evil beings. But that does not necessarily mean that they are zombies, no matter how much they may look like one. This is where things get tricky. You have to always be prepared to defend your life from zombies but you also have to find a way to ignore the instincts that you have honed to a point. A sharp point that looks like a pitchfork.

The first method I would recommend is the cold shower method. Like the ability to feel pride with your body, searing zombie hatred shrinks with a cold shower. If the IRS are milling about in your paperwork, excuse yourself for a quick shower to rinse off the murder. When you are done, you will be to preoccupied with no balls to worry about the scary men.

If that does not work, move onto a more progressive tactic. Grab your bottle of Tylenol and start chewing. It will be bitter and it will consume all of your senses. If you don’t have any Tylenol, grab the jar of cinnamon and have a spoonful. This is a little more drastic in nature, but sometimes when you are desperate, even a grocery bag will serve as a condom if you know what I mean. Press on.

If none of this works, then its on you to figure it out. Cut yourself or burn your arm over the stove. Go dry hump a pillow or dig a hole in the garden. I don’t care what it is, just do what’s right.

What I would do:
I would be in jail because I cannot untrain these instincts. I would kill the man and then try to cover it up. The tricky part with that is that the IRS isn’t to be fucked with. I would never see the free world again.

Scenario:
Ho ho ho, it’s time for Christmas.¹ You’re in the business of getting presents, and business is good if that’s the kind of business your family is good at. Or your friends, or whomever. Problem is that while you’re inside untying ribbon and shredding Christmas propaganda like ‘happy holidays’ wrapping paper, there’s a growing threat outside, getting ever closer to your door. And closer, but slowly, yet still closer, and it’s really cold outside so the going is pretty slow, but soon enough you and your family are in imminent danger. Next thing you know, Aunt Flufficans is looking kind of weird and the present you’re opening has some blood and a shitty wrapping job. Of course, inside you find a twitching zombie hand. Merry fucking Christmas. What do you do?

What you should do:
Fortunately for you and everyone else, you’re with the people you should be able to trust. Also, you can finally put all that “family” bullshit aside and take control, making those who best (and least) understand you do what you know is right to resolve the situation. This is your moment to shine, unlike that time you graduated from high school and everyone came to eat your cake, leaving behind only that symbolic alarm clock that squawks “HEY FUCKER! WELCOME TO THE REAL WORLD BITCH! I’MMA EAT YOU ALIVE!!” (which is of course why you want to destroy it always).

Now the first thing you should know to do is to throw that zombie hand in the oven and switch it into ‘Clean’ mode. This makes the oven rock out until it’s over 500 degrees, burning up all kinds of shit that’s inside, including infected zombie hands. This won’t burn away the bone, but the bone isn’t really the part you should be worrying about. In fact, if you can get Aunt Flufficans in there, all the better. If not, it’s best just to tie her up with some packaging tape and throw her in the basement where you can deal with her later without the sentimental puppy dog eyes of her relatives.

It’s important to understand that families are both the strongest and weakest groups of fighters, strong because they can work effectively together and have strong bonds that can overcome such things as disputes and blood vendettas (usually), but weak because the fall of one can crush the entire family into immobility. That is, if little brother Jimmy turns into a zombie, do your parents have the heart to vaporize his skull? Probably not, but you’d better because you should know better. Once a zombie, always a zombie, and certainly not a Jimmy. Just because you know a croak doesn’t mean you don’t kill a croak. Do for the family what the family itself is too weak to do.

After the immediate threats of the hand and the Aunt are dealt with, you need to understand why the old hag was zombified in the first place. Did someone leave a window open? Is there another zombie in the house? Did she just arrive and was it already too late by then? Sweep the house, gather munitions, and determine where the best defensible positions are in the house. Then turn on the news, if it’s still going, or look outside and check the status of the world. If the shit is too bad, you might need to turn that house into a fortress. If you can still move about the world with some relative safety, decide who has the best house for the job and get going. Hope you got something good for Christmas.

What I would do:
Hm. This is pretty much perfect for me, but to help you understand why, here’s a copy of this years’ Christmas list:

1. Chinese Assault Rifle
2. Explosive Arrows and Bow
3. W.A.S.P. Knife
4. More shotgun shells
5. Night-vision binoculars
6. Gun cleaning kit
7. Case of M.R.E.s
8. … (list continues)

Sure, I didn’t get everything I asked for, but with a list like that it’s hard to go wrong, and what better way to test out all the new gear than a sudden zombie invasion. Not only does ithelp us skip eating that crappy fruit cake, avoid the relations we’d rather not see, and all the other unpleasant parts of seeing family during the holidays, but it also helps release stress and tension by exploding zombos while at the same time creating a bonding experience for the whole family. Woops. I misfired my exploding arrow and hit Uncle Fucker in the leg while he was running from the zombies. Good thing it was explosive so I could get the whole crowd… Thanks mom!

The lesson here is that we can’t avoid our family or the holidays, but we can make the best of them if we’re smart about it.

Oh, and WTF is this?

¹ Well, sometimes we get around to things a little late here.

Scenario:

The happiest day of your life has come; the wedding ceremony.  You’re at the alter, standing next to an old guy who weirds you out like the time you saw Janet Jackson on the street and then found out it was a dude, and you’re waiting for your beautiful bride to say her “I do’s” and that whole ring thing and then finally the steamy kissing scene in front of the children and parents.  Except when you throw back the veil to look into her beautiful baby blues, all you see are a pair of dead whites and a cold face, with blue lips drooling around one white set of teeth desperately trying to eat your face off.  What do you do?

What you should do:

Snap to your senses, soldier!  You don’t go flying out into the world half-cocked with a ball and chain holding you back like a knife in the thigh.  If your ‘bride-to-be’ was dumb enough to get caught up in a zombie orgy of death and black endlessness, than you’ve shown your colors as one who doesn’t know how to pick em.  This goes as a notice to those of you who don’t have wives yet: if your girlfriend doesn’t tell you the finer points of zombie hunting by the third date, you need to have ‘The Talk,’ and if she doesn’t nod and laugh with a twinkle in her eye as she starts to collaborate with you, then she can go straight to hell and you can move on with your life.

Now, of course its too late and you have an undead nag on your hands, and she’s really struggling to get in your business.  But not in the good way.  So instead of flipping your lid and calling for momma’s help to throw down that damn succubus, you instead turn to the Good Book (every creepy old man has one) and give her a howdy-doody upside the head.  Of course this is just for show since that will neither kill a zombie nor guarantee to knock them down.  (Don’t fool yourself into believing zombies have anything to fear from religion; that’s dumb)  What this act will do, however, is get the old man tangled up in the mix, and soon enough she’ll forget all about you and take a mouth full out of his cheek, giving you time to walk down to the audience, grab a folding chair, and brutalize some reanimated sons of bitches.

What I would do:

Never forget what resources you have at your disposal.  That’s the lesson of the advice I just gave you.  The lesson for what I’m about to say is not to forget the friends you have at your assistance.  This, of course, assuming you pick your friends better than your wife and they don’t fuck around behind your back, leaving you to sober up alone at a bar in the middle of the night.

Instead of turning to a cold, metal chair to do my business, I’d turn to my Best Man (that’s the guy who stands behind you at the wedding).  You see, if there’s anyone in the world who could pull of the two-man steel-toe triple lateral, it would be my best man.  The manuever was inspired by a time when I saw someone’s head get cut clean cut off after two figure-skaters tried to go pro before they were ready.  In this maneuver, I eject the knives hidden in the toes of my dress shoes (which are actually just shiny shoes on top of combat boots) and get launched spinning through the air by the Best Man.  This rotational speed and momentum will decapitate everyone on the left side of the alter, including the Bride.  Game over.  Bitch.

Yeah, that blurred super-hero, that was me.  I just saved the fucking day.