A Good Re-Start

I added over a thousand words to my book tonight. I'm so happy to be done with school. :)

The Zombie Apocalypse Draws Nigh! A Different Kind of New Years Resolution

So I was reading this blog today. It's all about how to survive the upcoming zombie apocalypse. This appeals to me in ways I can't quite explain. As we all know, zombies will some day break free from some government compound or will be deposited by a malevolent alien intelligence. I share more than a few traits with this blogger. We both are (in her case "were" would be more appropriate) overweight, in fact, she started out at about the same weight I came back from Kuwait. She has problems with losing weight and being rather well endowed in the chestical-region. We also both long to be Sarah Connor in Terminator II.

So here is a list of skills that I have half plagiarized from her site and half come up with on my own... OK, maybe with a little bit of Tom's help. Now, unlike her site, I have not broken things down by basic, intermediate, and elite skills, I will break them down by skill type. I would like to accomplish roughly 75% of the things on this list in 2010. I have included some explanations of how or why I have listed these items The zombie survival skill set so far includes:

Food and water:

• Hunter safety course
• Shoot pistol and rifle
• Hunt with rifle (Mike M. - how do you feel about pronghorn?)
• Gut an animal
• Butcher said dead critter
• Forage (food and medicinal)
• Trap
• Lock picking
• Fishing
• Meat curing
• Canning
• Vegetable gardening
• Small farm animal husbandry
• Solar still

Shelter

• Fire building
• Hide tanning
• Kayaking/canoeing
• Basic outdoor survival techniques
• Ham radio operations

Self Defense

• Rappelling
• Run
• Climb
• Hot wire a car
• Small engine repair
• Bicycle repair
• Basic explosives/explosives safety
• Gun maintenance/cleaning
• Knife maintenance
• Close quarters battle (CQB)
• Defensive driving

Physical Conditioning

• Run 5 K in 30 minutes (Marine female minimum PT test)
• 15 seconds flexed arm hang (More Marine minimums (MM)
• 44 crunches (MM)
• Perform the Army's 12 mile tactical foot march (under 3 hours, carrying 30 lbs)
• Learn to swim
• Hike Pike's Peak in 48 hours (26 miles each way)
• Lose at least 30 lbs (just over a half a pound a week)

There is an informal "law" called the law of 3's. This law states that a human can survive (more or less) for 3 minutes without air, 3 hours without shelter, 3 days without water and 3 weeks without food. I'm not saying these are going to be pleasant hours, days or weeks, but it can be done, and it sets an order of importance. I don't think any of the zombie experts I've been reading have ever suggested that the appearance of zombies will usher in a lack of oxygen in the atmosphere, so I won't worry about that imperative. Beyond that, if caught a human can not survive at all once bitten or eaten by a zombie, so the ability to just get away from the shambling hoards should be the first priority. Again, assuming air is still plentiful. This is where the physical conditioning category comes in.

So moving on, I will need to next provide myself with shelter. Everyone knows that zombies don't do well in cold weather. Common zombie wisdom says they lack the ability to turn food into energy. Here's how various experts have come to this conclusion. First, since people bitten by a zombie also turn into zombies, it is doubtful that zombies bite and eat human flesh because they're hungry. More likely, the zombies chasing down and chewing on your cube-mate is doing so because it is driven by the zombie virus and this is how the infection is spread. This is much the way rabies is spread. Secondly, a zombie is pretty much dead animated flesh, as evidenced by the fact that when you chop their arm off with a machete or chainsaw, they keep shambling onward toward braaaaaaiiiiiiiins.... So if their extremities are dead, it is logical to assume that their digestive systems are also dead. This means that once freezing conditions are met, a zombie should turn into a little undead-cicle. Gross, but that means that I would only really have to learn how to get by in cold conditions and not to do full on battle during the harshest time of the year. Granted, I would still do my part as a good American by decapitating any frozen undead I came across, but other than the energy it would take to hack through frozen flesh, I should be OK.

Anyway, back to the shelter thing. If I can get to or otherwise provide myself with some sort of shelter within three hours, I should keep myself from turning into a Heather-cicle. Moving on to water, I will need to learn to get some. Initially, in populated areas, I should have access to public water, but if, for instance, the utility workers have all joined the ranks of the walking dead, that won't last long. I will need to be able to get where the looters can't and that means being able to get past locked doors. Eventually, even those supplies will run out and I will nature herself to provide for me.

Next, I need to be able to feed myself and anyone else that has been wise enough to follow me. For this reason I need to know the most effective ways to forage in the wild for edible plants and animals. This works nicely with my last big goal: novel writing. I lost one and only one challenge in my 50,000 word count goal, and that was to go hunting with Mike M. I need to track this boy down, so if anyone knows how to reach him, tell him I am ready to repay my debt in full. Of course, Tom and his Michigan friends are no slouches either, so I should have a wide array of teachers in the hunting department. I will also need to become familiar with finding and preparing local flora which I have seen classes for.

Finally, I need to be able to protect myself. This goes along with the shootin' thing, but there are a lot of other things a girl needs to know, like how to successfully clear a building to make sure no half-decayed mall employees are lying in wait before my friends and I hit the Orange Julius.

OK, so finally, the zombies will all die off. There are only so many available cattle-like humans on which to feed and I'm thinking the first good winter should probably take out a lot of the nasty buggers. So at some point, humans like my pals and I should be able to start subsistence farming. At this point, communicating with other survivors and basic farming skills should come in really handy.

So that's it! Anyone have any suggestions of survival or training goals that might be more important or realistic? Does anyone else want in on the zombie apocalypse training for 2010? Of course, if you're afraid of coming off as some zany wing-nut, you could always just tell people that you have committed yourself to doing fitness and survival training as your 2010 New Years resolutions. But what fun would that be?

A final thought:

BRAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIINNNNNNSSSSSssssssss!

Two Great Loves

I am just putting this out there because it happens to combine two of my great loves: the PVP webcomic and Cambodian children. One of the characters in the comic is Skull the Troll. He is a sweet, but rather gassy... well, he's a troll. Anyway, the maker of the comic has done well enough that he sells swag on his website related to the comic. One of these things is the Skull plushy, which is a fabulous thing, in and of itself, but someone took one of these plushies around the world and took pictures of Skull in various famous places (not unlike a certain snowman I know) and made a calendar of the best of his pictures. This calendar is now being sold and the proceeds will go to build a school for some children in Cambodia. Nice, hu? So if anyone is at a loss for what to get me (or any other self-respecting nerd on their list) for Christmas, this would be a fabulous gift.

http://www.pvpstuff.com/calendar-skull-ee.html

18 Years In The Making

I awoke well rested, but unwilling to get out of bed. As I lay there after shutting off my alarm, I mentally fast-forwarded through my day. I showered, dressed, did my makeup, made coffee and argued with Tom about the fact that there is a difference between instant and old fashioned oat meal. I had packed some drinks and food for lunch and jotted down a cram sheet the night before. I noticed that large, dry snow flakes were falling outside, and I braced myself for the cold as I locked the door behind me.

I plotted the one and a half hour course to the college campus on my GPS. I never imagined I would get there by the arrival time the device showed. As I drove north on 1-25, I listened to the news, then some top 40 bubble-gum pop, then finally settled down with some classical string quartet music, courtesy of NPR. I had a flash of a memory where my very nerdy friend, Devin called me a hippy for leaving his truck's radio on NPR. Funny. I don't feel much like a hippy. And I very serously doubt that I would be welcome in their ranks if I tried to pass myself off as one.

I drove past Castle Rock without too much incident. The snow had been light and the roads were reasonably dry. As the dry powder curled in tiny tendrils on the asphalt, I was reminded of sand storms in Kuwait. The sand crossing the roads there look like little pissed off snakes all heading in generally the same direction, but with a chaotic method of getting there. The snow was cold and dry and only a few shades whiter than that sand had been.

Coming over a hill, I had that sickening lurch in the stomach when you realize you might die. Cars had been backed up the hill and were not moving much faster than I could have walked. As I stepped on the breaks, I began to slide to the right. I took my foot mostly off the breaks and slowed as much as I could with a light touch to the pedal. I seemed to accelerate, as I slid down the hill toward the slowed traffic. I looked in my mirrors. There was no one beside me, so I angled the Mini to the right. As the car began to start a slow spin, I straightened the wheels and slowed to a stop. No one behind me was in a mood to go much over 10 miles per hour for the next 20 miles.

Other cars began to appear on the side of the road. Crushed in fronts and sides left little to the imagination about what had happened to put them there. Finally, around mid-Denver, the roads dried up and I was at the college parking lot only a half hour after I had intended to arrive.

I paid the attendant and gathered my things. As I walked toward the building I wondered exactly why a college student hall would have a giant steam stack on it. I still haven't figured that one out. I suspect there may be a brewery attached, which would make Metro State about the coolest college I've ever seen.

I stopped outside the testing center and briefly crammed for the first of two finals. It was the easier of the two and I knew I would need more extensive cramming for the second. I walked in and they gave me a deal on the price of the test, since I was taking two of them that day. I took this as a good omen.

The first exam was all about security policy. Since that's my bread and butter at work, I breezed through the exam in less than an hour, leaving two more hours that I could have sat and twiddled my thumbs or contemplated the fact that my belly button to a small extent resembles a black hole. Instead, I handed in the test and went out to the commons area to cram for the second exam.

Half way through the second exam, I looked at the clock. Had it really only been 20 minutes since I started it? A smile of self satisfaction plastered itself on my face. The wrinkle that is threatening to become permanent smoothed out between my eyebrows. I gave the booklet a cursory glance at the 40 minute mark to make sure I hadn't missed anything. I hadn't.

I walked out of the oddly steam-stacked student hall dialing my husband. Tom's pride shone in his voice, though he was reserved. He suggested we go to an Irish pub to celebrate and I readily agreed.

I got in my car and posted my triumph on Facebook. I had a hard time not exulting too much, since I do not yet have a sheepskin in my hot little hands. However, on the two hour drive back to Colorado Springs, my phone kept chirping happily at me with replies to my post. Not only have I been successful in this venture that has taken me 18 years to complete, but I am loved by a good many people who will revel in my successes with me. That makes it all worth it.