Zomb Zomb Om Noms: Brains

As a child, I believed that “zombie” was a lazy Halloween costume. As a pre-teen, I believed that “zombie” was a sub-genre, buried somewhere under horror (and maybe camp). As a teenager, I only slightly expanded my understanding with Army of Darkness and Shaun of the Dead. I had no idea the vast worlds, viruses, mutations, curses, and apocalyptic gore effects I was missing out on.

Dexter would like to examine that splatter pattern.
(image by Damon Green)

Way back, I hit up a quick podcasting panel at the zombie-apocalypse-themed Marscon (next year’s theme is Twisted Fairy Tale). Two of the presenters were Alfredo Torres of the Torres vs. Zombies and Jason Bayless of Zombie Popcorn, whose latest post is about how to set up a safe Zombies Vs. Paintballs course. Sheer badass.

Jason explained that zombies aren’t just about movies or genres or even just a sub-culture of fans, zombies are a multi-billion dollar industry. Yes, billion. Since then, I’ve got a much better grasp on exactly how extensive the contagion has become.

Wikipedia has a page dedicated to Zombie Walks/Pub Crawls. Seattle claims to be the “Zombie Capital of the World” with ZomBcon (for a while they were contenders for the Guinness World Record for Largest Gathering of Zombies). Then, there’s events around October like the DC Zombie Lurch, Arlington Drafthouse's Zombie Festival, and the Silver Spring's Zombie Walk.

"The Fresh Start Club" (art © Paul Kidby and
characters © Terry Pratchett's The Fifth Elephant)

Oh, and don’t forget the DC Zombie Crawl is this Friday. Evidently, zombies are like white shoes: once Labor Day Weekend hits, it’s a free-for-all.

Although it may seem early to bring this up, Run for Your Lives’s MD event has moved their run date to earlier in October. However, there’s $10 off the price of admission at the moment. Zombie positions are sold out, and runner admission is already 65% full. They will sell out. Heed the advice I gave in my review as a novice runner. Spoiler: If the treadmill on its highest incline makes you uncomfortable, you need to train harder.

Here’s our video that shows a taste of what you’ll be facing. Apologies in advance for the haze. I’d forgotten that freezing fucking cold water obstacles = condensation. Special thanks to my EMT teammate, Sabrina, for (a) telling me when to get off the course without injury and (b) taking the videography helm when I fell to the zombs.

Music by Projekt Niewidzialne "Szybciej," and sound effects by Duckett
"2:30 AM: The Old Asylum," and "Uh-Oh." Video editing by Roberto Flores.
Recording by Sabrina, Aine, and Brannen (mostly Sabrina ♥).

We’ve interviewed one of the owners of Hallow, Inc’s indoor haunted house. You can hear the screams in the background. Of course, our favorite Paranormal Folk singer, Jonah Knight has made it onto our site and the podcast multiple times, and he’s contributed several episodes of Jonah’s Musical Corner (his own podcast is Pros and Cons). Scooter even found a zombie love song for you for Valentine’s Day.

I have to admit, I use Jonah’s article Age of Steam and its songs about failed zombie and cloning experiments to motivate me while using the new Zombies, Run! 5k Training. You may remember I reviewed the original app. I even had the chance to interview Adrian Hon, co-founder of Six to Start; they’re the “next generation storytellers” who worked with Naomi Alderman to create this Kickstarter success. The reason I’m on the 5k training app not only gets you new story, it makes sure you’re ready for the full program. I did shell out for the the full Season 2 Pack Plus, which I can’t wait to dig into.

I think the face wounds really brings out their eyes.
(image by Gianluca Ramalho Misiti)

To give a bit more legitimacy and gravitas (although DC Geeks is always working to garner both?), NPR covered the spread of a viral plague in WoW, and its study by the Tufts Medical Center. The official Center for Disease Control website has a page dedicated to zombie preparedness. Vendors like Zombie Survival Packs sell various sizes of GTFO kits and go bags for when zombies hit.

Then, there’s a subreddit for zombies and others for suggested safe zones and zombie survival tactics. There’s lots of interesting posts and advice squirrelled away behind the idiocy of the default front page of Reddit. I recommend starting with bugout and all the links in its sidebar. On a more serious note, debating zombie contingencies forces you to consider tactics for many other emergency situations - and that’s not just for those of you self-identified preppers.

Just remember, don’t panic.