Dr Dale's Zombie Dictionary E-Book

Dale Seslick

• Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2010

Seitenzahl: 338

Beschreibung

Worried about what to do in the event of the dead rising from their graves and trying to destroy humanity? Worry no more! With the help of numerous films and Wikipedia, Dr Dale has compiled this rigorously researched A-Z list of everything you need to know about zombies: how to recognise them, how to fight them and even how to classify them. He can answer all of your burning questions including: How can a sheep help defend me against the undead? What will the response of the Women's Institute be to an attack? What's the most useful style of dance to know in the event of the apocalypse? From the best kind of clothing to wear to the most appropriate soundtrack for a zombie apocalypse, this is the ultimate guide to preparing for and surviving the return of the undead. Full money back guarantee offered should you die in a zombie apocalypse within 30 days of purchase

Leseprobe

Dr Dale’s ZOMBIE DICTIONARY

The A-Z Guide to Staying Alive

DR DALE SESLICK

Illustrated by Jack Knight

Dedication

Dr Dale wishes to thank all those who have been integral to the research that is included in this edition.

With special consideration to Donald, Judy and Tristen for their continuing hard work and dedication.

And the random homeless people who gave their time and bodies for a plate of sandwiches in order for us to carry out experiments on them, in the current absence of any undead.

Keep vigilant and stay safe.

Contents

Title PageDedicationINTRODUCTIONZOMBIES: THE BASICSABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZDR DALE’s FINALWORDS OF WISDOMACKNOWLEDGEMENTSAbout the AuthorCopyright

INTRODUCTION

Hi, I’m Dr Dale from Dr Dale’s School of Survival, and I’ve written this book to make sure you don’t get your intestines ripped out.

First of all, let me thank you for buying my ZombieDictionary, for taking this positive step to guarantee your own survival should the undead rise. You should take a moment now to feel a great sense of inner peace, satisfied that you had the foresight and strength to admit that you needed the ZombieDictionary in order to prepare for the zombie apocalypse. You needed Dr Dale’s help. Yes, that’s it, let that cosy feeling of needing me just flow right through you.

OK, that’s enough inner peace and self satisfaction. We should really get down to the business of making sure you don’t die… And rise again.

Those of you who have purchased this book in the hope of finding out all about the best firearms, heavy artillery, torpedoes, missiles, tanks and submarines will be sorely disappointed. Here at the School of Survival, those are not the kind of methods we use. During a zombie apocalypse, guns will be in short supply – they also require ammunition and constant maintenance to make sure they are at peak performance. All this means that they are unreliable. You need to learn how to survive using anything and everything you can get your hands on as well as a healthy dose of common sense, and that is what we shall be focusing on in these pages.

Throughout this dictionary there will be facts that will shock, astound and amaze you in equal measure – but be aware that none of the advice can be taken as definitive. As yet, no zombies have risen from the grave on which to test our theories. However, like most resourceful, intelligent people, here at the school we have researched our information thoroughly using movies, books, blogs, forums, Wikipedia and a man down the pub who we think is called Bob…or perhaps Bert – can’t really remember, but he does wear a hat.

We hope you have an informative and life-changing journey with us through the pages of the Zombie Dictionary and if, in fact, this information turns out not to be useful and you don’t survive a zombie apocalypse, we are happy to give you a full no-qualms refund if the book is returned within 30 days of purchase, with a valid receipt, by the person who bought it.

ZOMBIES: THE BASICS

As many of you know, the word zombies begins with a Z which is the last letter of the alphabet and though some of you may find it too radical a step to cope with at this stage of your training I am going to cover ‘the Z word’ first as I feel it’s important we all know what we’re dealing with. 

There is certain knowledge that I will take for granted during the book as I assume you are all aware of the basics of Zombie Mythology. For those who aren’t, here’s a brief introduction:

1) A Zombie is dead!

In recent films and in the media (28 Days Later and Left4 Dead) zombies have been portrayed as humans who have become infected with some form of virus that has made them crave human flesh and become a bit grumpy. These are not zombies. These are people who want to eat other live human beings and are more commonly referred to as cannibals (and this is not the Dictionary of CannibalSurvival – that book will be available soon). The only zombies being dealt with in these pages are those that have been previously human, became infected, died and reanimated again.

2) A Zombie bite is infectious.

There are various ways in which a human can become a zombie (see Classification) but we do know one thing for sure. If you are bitten by a zombie you will die and rise again as a zombie yourself. Zombies attack with their mouths and this has given rise to the misconception that they are trying to ‘eat’ you. As the zombies’ digestive system is no longer operational it is highly unlikely that this is the case. The instinct to bite is merely the virus’s way of spreading and increasing the zombie masses.

3) Zombies can only be ‘killed’ by destroying the brain.

A zombie’s Achilles heel is not its heel but its brain and the only way to destroy a zombie is to destroy its brain. As all other bodily functions and systems shut down on death, the only thing that keeps the zombie going is its brain. This means that zombies are impervious to pain so will keep coming until you achieve a head shot (the reason you go for a head shot is that the brain is kept in the head – that’s the round thing on your neck with hair on top and a face on the front). This is why your choice of weapon is important – but more of that later.

4) There is no cure.

There is no cure for a zombie infection. Once you are bitten, you become a zombie. So stop thinking there is a cure because there isn’t. Even if there is it’s important that you think there isn’t. Because thinking there’s a cure will give you hope, and hope will make you weak, and weakness will make you lose, and losing mean you die, and dying means you rise, and rising means you become a zombie – for which there is no cure. So stop thinking there’s a cure because that will give you hope and hope will make you weak and… You get the message.

Those are the basics of zombies and that is all you need to know so far. Don’t worry about why the dead have started to rise or indeed how the dead have started to rise. Once they rise it does become somewhat of a moot point. Your only concern once the apocalypse begins is to survive – not to question the whole affair.

Remember, the zombies won’t be bothered why it happened – they’ll just be focused on biting you. You need to focus too. On living.

Let us continue…

A

AARDVARK

In African folklore the aardvark is much admired because of its diligent quest for food and its fearless response to the strong, warlike soldier ant. In the event of a zombie apocalypse, we should all take a lesson from the humble aardvark in order to survive, using the analogy that you are an aardvark and the undead hordes are a swarm of warrior ants. Do not take this analogy too far though, as zombies cannot be killed with Nippon.

African Hausa magicians make charms from the heart, skin, forehead and nails of the aardvark, which are then pounded together with the root of a certain tree. Wrapped in a piece of skin and worn on the chest, the charm is said to give the owner the ability to pass through walls or roofs at night.

Should you happen to come across an aardvark during the apocalypse and wish to try this technique, we recommend getting a friend you are not terribly fond of to attempt it first as we cannot guarantee the success of the charm having never used it ourselves. A better use for an aardvark, given its average weight of 80–150 lb and length of up to 7 feet, is to freeze it solid and use it as a bludgeoning weapon.

ABYSS

An abyss, as described in the Collins dictionary, is a very deephole or chasm, and you most certainly wouldn’t want to end up in one of those during the days of the dead. Abyss, however, is also a very atmospheric word that can be used when you wish to come across as a mean and moody person of action when implementing a dangerous plan.

USING THE WORD ‘ABYSS’

EXAMPLE 1: Your entire group is poised at the exit to your safe house ready to leave and seek out food and supplies. Just before you open the door you turn and say: ‘Time to enter the abyss’, raise your eyebrow, nod slowly, and leave. The others regard you as brave and wise.

EXAMPLE 2: You are in the safety of your sanctuary and decide to go to the bathroom to relieve your bowels. As you reach the door you turn to the rest of the room and say: ‘Time to enter the abyss’, raise your eyebrow, nod slowly, and leave. The others regard you as brave and wise.

EXAMPLE 3: Not to be confused with Abyssinia (the country). If you announce: ‘Time to enter Abyssinia’ the others will regard you as geographically incompetent or wonder how you are getting to Ethiopia (where there isn’t much food anyway).

ALIENS

I know exactly what you’re planning to do – you’re planning to skip this bit because you think it’s a bit silly to be discussing aliens in a book that purports to be about zombies. Well, I’m afraid if you want to learn all there is to learn you’re just going to have to suck it up and carry on reading as aliens may very well be an issue.

It is a distinct possibility that, should aliens exist, they may have the technology and capability of reanimating the dead and giving them a penchant for biting and shambling. We have chemical weapons of our own so it’s within the realms of possibility that aliens may invade our planet by turning our dead against us. They could also come along and take over our bodies like in Invasion of the Body Snatchers (the original and not the wishy-washy Nicole Kidman remake. Didn’t you just want her to stop whining about her kid and shoot Daniel Craig in the head?). Thus they could create parasitic zombies (see Classification: Parasitic Zombie). It is also mildly plausible that a zombie apocalypse could be caused accidentally on their part (we’re managing to destroy our own planet by a series of industrial ‘accidents’ so it’s no great leap to think an alien species couldn’t do the same).

These theories are, of course, conjecture. As yet, there is no definitive proof that there is any life out there in the vast glory of space other than this one little planet just spinning around trying to make something of itself. It would, however, be rather self-indulgent of us to assume that we are the only intelligent life form to exist in the universe, either by God’s design or by evolutionary process (whichever your favourite cheese happens to be), which may lead you to wonder why, if they are ‘out there’, have they not bothered to show themselves yet?

Scholars will say that it is because we are at heart a violent race and are intent on our own destruction, so intelligent life from far-off planets would not dream of coming here for fear of being captured, experimented on or infected by our dirty human genes. I have my own personal theory on why aliens have decided to steer clear and that is that in September 1977 the Carpenters released the song ‘Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft’. Anyone passing by in their spaceship and hearing those lyrics blasted over the airwaves would have serious second thoughts about visiting a planet that beseeched the ‘interstellar policeman’ to give us a sign we’ve reached him.They would just wind up their windows and fly on by, warning the kids in the back seat never to get mixed up with the weirdos on that planet.

FACT 1: The British have a long-standing joke about folks from America being a bit kooky and ‘out there’. So would any Brits care to explain why this song only charted at number 31 in the US charts whilst you took it all the way to number 9? (And you Irish have nothing to laugh about! It reached number 1 in your charts!)

FACT 2: To stop any nerdy nerdy geek geeks writing in, I am fully aware the original was released by Klaatu in 1976 but they were a progressive rock band who named themselves after the alien from The Day the Earth Stood Still so you expect them to be a little ‘out there’. The Carpenters sang Burt Bacharach lyrics and Sesame Street songs, what on earth are they doing trying to contact aliens? Did I just answer my own question then?

ALLERGIES

When a person becomes a zombie, they will still bear the physical characteristics from when they were alive (i.e. they’ll still have blue eyes, a large nose, ginger hair – god forbid).They will also carry over any physical ailments, meaning that if they were in a wheelchair when they were alive, they would still be unable to walk as a zombie. Deductive reasoning should lead us to believe that if a person was allergic to something when they were alive, they will be allergic to it when they become a member of Team Z. If we are to subscribe to this theory then the best weapon to carry around with you is a peanut.

Approximately 798,188 people are allergic to peanuts in the UK (that’s about the population of Leeds… Or two Manchesters… Four Portsmouths or 40 Bangors). In a worst-case scenario this allergy can cause anaphylactic shock or even death. So laying peanuts around the outside of your safehouse should act as a reasonable deterrent.

Unfortunately, as everything but zombies’ brains shut down and it tends to be the respiratory system that is affected by anapphalacticaicalaphan…(these long medical words escape me, but you get the drift), this may not actually work.But, if it doesn’t, you could still try throwing the peanuts really hard and hope to pierce an attacking zombie’s skull.Or if you had a lot of peanuts you could drop them on the zombie, thus crushing him. Or if you dropped a peanut from the top of the Empire State building it could reach the velocity of a bullet and smash the zombie’s brain… Or you could just use an axe.

ALTRUISM

Ah, good. I was hoping that there would be an A word that would cover this subject of selflessness and helping others. That way I wouldn’t have to wait too long before teaching you the best way to behave during a zombie apocalypse – being altruistic isn’t it.

When the undead rise you must become the most selfish, self-absorbed, egotistical person EVER. Survival (and this may come as a shock to some of you) is about surviving and you’re only going to do that if you completely and unequivocally look after number one. And if I need to make this any clearer – the number one I am talking about is YOU.

Do not give your food away to anyone unless you are getting something useful in return – even if they are dying of hunger. By giving your supplies to them you only delay the inevitable death of both of you.Do not give your weapons away to anyone unless you get something useful in return. You will learn from this book that anything can be utilised as a weapon so if someone is useless enough to have found nothing to use as a weapon it will be a waste of time giving them your valuable items.Do not let anyone into your safe house – even if you know, love and cherish them. Who’s to say they haven’t been bitten or infected? Even a loved one will lie to you in order to aid their own survival.Lie, cheat and steal to get what you want. Even consider murder as a viable option. As the apocalypse rages on, resources will become scarcer and it willbecome a dog-eat-dog world. Make sure you are the biggest dog in the kennel otherwise you will be left with nothing.

This may all seem a little harsh and if you are a mild-mannered person of essentially quite a British upbringing it will be a difficult adjustment. Trust me, though. If you do not adopt this attitude you will fail in your quest for survival. You will learn to live with the guilt.

ANIMALS

One of the most frequently asked questions by anyone attending my seminars is ‘Dr Dale, can I have your telephone number?’, the answer to which greatly depends on how attractive and affluent the questioner is.

One of the second most frequently asked questions is ‘Can animals become zombies?’ As we have yet to experience the apocalypse, and so are unaware of what form of outbreak we will encounter, it would be remiss of me to give a definitive answer.

However, research at the School of Survival states that it would be highly unlikely for us to come face to face with a zombie hamster (not only because hamsters are so small and would have to be perched on a bookcase, or a child’s head, in order to come face to face with you).

The deductive reasoning behind this is as follows: The mostlikely cause of a zombie outbreak is through experimentation gonewrong. The experimentation would have to be carried out onhumans in order to be transmitted to humans in order to create azombie apocalypse. The fact that the experiment was so complex thatit could reanimate a human corpse and could only be destroyed byeliminating the brain would mean that it would be a very specificexperiment unlikely to cross-pollinate to other species with differentgenetic make-up and biology. Ergo, the zombie virus would nottransmit to animals.

Of course, science is never an exact science and you may be thinking that if diseases like swine flu, bird flu and mad cow disease can pass from animals to humans, then it’s safe to assume that no matter how specific the disease, it could still mutate and transfer from humans to animals. To further substantiate that particular theory, we have had some small success in the School of Survival in proving that animals will suffer from human diseases, and thus far have managed to give a goldfish Alzheimer’s, a duck chickenpox, a chicken duckpox and a kangaroo gonorrhoea.

Bear in mind that both humans and animals can be equally affected by rabies, which is the closest to a zombie virus. In fact, humans may not become infected at all and we may instead be faced with a kitten apocalypse, which does not bear thinking about. Come to think of it, your best bet on hearing of a zombie outbreak, is to kill all nearby animals immediately – including beloved family pets – and put them in cold storage to be used later for food. It’s always better to be safe than sorry.

ANIMALS (TRAINING OF)

Should it transpire that animals are immune to the zombie virus, and you didn’t follow my advice of immediately placing them in cold storage due to a misguided sentimental attachment to your gerbil Puffin, you could always consider training animals to help you during the zombie apocalypse.

Animals can be taught to carry out any number of simple tasks: going on scavenging missions, search and rescue, attack and defence, diversion, guarding safe houses or carrying supplies. The first animal that springs to mind when considering likely animals to train is, of course, a dog.

However, even though they are probably the most domesticated and easily trained of animals, this does not necessarily make dogs the best option. Historically, dogs and humans have a strong emotional bond, some people even value the companionship of our four-legged friends over that of other humans – they dress them up in little outfits and put bows on their ears and carry them around in purpose-made handbags and make videos of them doing cute things like falling down stairs or chasing their own tails and then send the tapes to You’ve Been Framed giving ITV a reason to keep showing the programme and torturing the rest of humanity… My point (apart from that people who do that should be stabbed with a pointy stick) is that humans can become easily attached to dogs and would be unlikely to send their beloved canine companions out to battle with a horde of zombies unprotected.

Where does that leave us? Taking this emotional weakness into consideration, and after many hours of research, we have discovered that in actual fact the best animals to train up are sheep.

The good thing about sheep is that there are lots of them and they all look alike. They are docile and easily led and can be trained to carry out simple tasks. Scientists can also clone sheep. So if you run out of natural sheep you can just nip along to your local cloning centre and get some more. The mere fact that they all look alike means that if you have several highly trained sheep on your team you will be unable to tell them apart and therefore will not become emotionally attached to them (unless you put different coloured hats on each of the sheep, but bear in mind that whilst you are not looking the sheep may swap hats meaning that you may still be uncertain of which sheep is which. They’re crafty like that, are sheep).

The only thing to consider when training sheep is that they are not very good at multitasking and so you will only be able to train each sheep to carry out one specific task. These tasks are as follows:

Attack Sheep:

A sheep that will attack. Sheep aren’t particularly good at jumping so their attacks will be focused mainly on areas of the zombie below the knee level. It is possible to train the sheep to lever itself on its hind legs against the zombie, therefore raising its mouth to chest level, but this still won’t take it to the level of the brain. You can only hope that the zombie will stoop low to fight back, thus putting its head in the line of fire. Either that or you could train the sheep to stand on top of each other.

Defence Sheep:

Sheep can be trained to form natural barriers against doors and windows and can cause enough ballast (depending on the number of sheep) to hold a door or window closed, or block a passageway or street. You can also use defence sheep whilst travelling from place to place. If you stand in the centre of a group of sheep, the zombies will attack them first leaving you time to escape while the undead chomp on your woolly friends.

Reconnaissance Sheep:

A sheep can blend into most surroundings as long as it is covered in snow or clouds. If this is the case then you can send a sheep to carry out reconnaissance work by strapping a video camera to its back. As it cannot be seen, it will be able to return to you unscathed.

Guard Sheep:

The piercing ‘Baa’ of a sheep could raise the dead. But it’s not raising the dead you’re worried about, it’s drawing attention to yourself from the undead.

Sheep are always alert. They may fool onlookers by seeming docile and stupid, but secretly those piercing eyes are watching every movement like a hawk. A sheep can also be trained to recognise your friends as well as your enemies, and can be placed as an effective sentry on a door as long as the password is ‘Baa’.

Search Sheep:

This is the one area of difficulty we have encountered in effectively training sheep. More often than not when sent on a search mission to find supplies, they will invariably lead us to grass. Be prepared to put time and effort into training the search sheep. Unless you like grass.

Of course, sheep are not the only animals that can be trained to carry out these tasks. These creatures have also shown themselves to be suitable for training: cows, pigs, ducks, badgers, frogs and voles. Just ensure that should you run out of sheep and have to use a different animal for sentry duty, you make your team aware that the password is no longer ‘Baa’ to avoid unnecessary confusion.

ANORAK

NO! NO! NO! They are brightly coloured so you will be easily spotted, and they rustle so you will be heard from a million miles away. OK, so they’re waterproof, but I can assure you that in these dire circumstances rain will be the least of your worries. The only advantage to your wearing an anorak is that when you become a zombie (which you will because your friends will happily sacrifice you) it will be twice as enjoyable to kill you.

ANTHRACITE

Anthracite coal is probably the best fuel to use during a zombie apocalypse. Not only does it burn with little smoke or flame – so will be less likely to attract attention – but it also gives off intense heat and lasts longer than normal coal. The only downside to using this particular form of fuel is that it is very difficult to come by. Your best bet to actually obtain this special and rare item is to find an anthracite mine and to make that your command post and sanctuary during the siege of the dead.

A plus point to setting up your base in an anthracite mine is that in its very nature a mine is underground (apart from cloud mines) and thus will have limited access points for zombies to get in – and these are easily guarded. The problem is that there are very few anthracite mines around. The most famous of all the anthracite mines is based in Pottsville, Pennsylvania, and although this may seem like a bit of a trek for some of you, we do recommend you make the effort to get to it. Not only does it have an anthracite mine, but it is also built on top of seven hills (making it easier to fortify). The population is also very low, currently estimated at under 15,000, so there’d be fewer zombies to kill if they become infected.

I think this advice is best summed up in the words of General James Nagle: ‘In times of the rising of corpses, head for the Pottsville anthracite mine in Pennsylvania.’

Wise words indeed.

ARMOUR (MEDIEVAL)

Do not bother wearing a suit of armour. It will be heavy and unwieldy. It will greatly reduce your speed and most importantly is an absolute nightmare to remove when you need a wee.

ARMOUR (OTHER TYPES)

Although you should definitely avoid wearing medieval armour, as explained in the previous entry, there are other forms of protective clothing that you may also have considered. Riot gear for example, or martial arts training gear, or indeed a shark suit (being a suit that protects against shark bites rather than a suit that makes you look like a shark). I’m not saying that it’s not a good idea to wear armour if you have it to hand but I wouldn’t go out of my way to seek it out as protective clothing.

In order to survive, you need to avoid the undead and surely preparing to be bitten is tempting fate somewhat? Thinking you are completely protected from zombie bites will give you a false sense of security and you may put yourself in more dangerous situations. One minute you’re strolling down the road and the zombies appear. You don’t run, you think you can walk straight through the horde, but then more and more of them appear and you decide this wasn’t such a good idea after all so you jump into the nearby river to escape, but there’s a shark in there and it attacks you but it can’t bite through the shark suit and it gets annoyed and swims off and you think you’re safe, but you’re not because the shark just went to get its mate – the Mega Shark – and then the Giant Octopus turns up too and now you’re truly screwed.

See what happens when you tempt fate by wearing armour? Take my advice and concentrate on avoidance rather than protection – it’l make life easier.

ATTORNEY

Also referred to as a solicitor or lawyer. An attorney will not be terribly useful during an apocalypse (although if mine survives he assures me that he has found a legal loophole that will grant me ownership of Devon should all the inhabitants die).

You should, however, keep an attorney on retainer while you are training for the apocalypse. They may prove useful when that stray throwing star hits an old lady in the head, or you accidentally knock a post office down with a rickshaw. They will keep you out of prison and quash any fines, leaving you to continue your preparation.

AUTHORITIES

From all the research we have done into how people within positions of power and authority will react during a zombie apocalypse, we have garnered one singularly important piece of information: they will be of no help at all. Their complete ineptitude, ignorance and failure to accept the seriousness of the situation before it’s too late will no doubt lead to hundreds of thousands dying and being reanimated. So our advice is to not bother going anywhere near any person in a position of power, because you will end up dead.

Councils and Governments will nod sagely and tell us that everything is under control even when their offices are overrun and their secretaries are being gnawed on by the undead.

What do they have to worry about? They’ve got their own secret bunkers to dive into. And they probably started the whole thing anyway by sanctioning some deranged scientific experiment.

TheArmy will follow protocol to the letter. Trusting that their superiors know what’s going on they will quarantine infected areas leaving those who have not yet been bitten unable to escape. They will pay no attention to anyone who is trying to explain to them that their whole family has just been infected, and they will happily nuke entire cities just to keep the infection under control, with no regard for anyone who may still be alive inside. After all, what’s a little collateral damage between friends?

What do they have to worry about? They’ve got guns as standard issue. And they probably started the whole thing anyway through some deranged weapons experiment.

The Police will pat you on the head and tell you to run along home now, sonny, when you try and explain to them that the local shopping centre has been invaded by the undead. On subsequently learning the truth, they will incarcerate you and hold you to blame. They will immediately instigate martial law and kill anything that vaguely resembles a zombie. We are led to believe this is due to fear and panic, but really it’s because deep down they’re all power-crazed maniacs who are all fully paid-up members of the local fascist society.

They will pay no attention to anyone else’s advice and invariably get themselves killed en masse due to badly organised strike teams. They will most definitely set up a road block somewhere that consists of two police vehicles placed in a chevron formation and then hide behind their bonnets with a megaphone (one or both of these police vehicles will then subsequently explode).

What do they have to worry about? They’ve got the law on their hands. And they probably started the whole thing anyway by failing to spot and control the initial outbreak.

Secret Government andNon-GovernmentOrganisations will stay very much out of the way. They won’t even leave their office or secret laboratory. Ever. They will attempt to aid the other authorities by feeding them irrelevant information so that they don’t get the blame for the mass carnage that is occurring. They will be searching continually for a cure to the infection and will always be so close but so far.

What do they have to worry about? They have endless funding and resources and are securely locked away in their high-security offices. And they probably started the whole thing anyway, that being the kind of thing secret organisations do.

The Women’s Institute will call a meeting immediately to attempt to reschedule the jams and jellies social to a time when Marjorie isn’t chomping on her husband. They will try to find an alternative venue for the summer fête as the field they had planned to use is now overrun with the undead. They will realise that raffle prizes will now become more difficult to come by as shops are being looted by scavengers, and although they know that they will have to cancel their coach trip to Bognor, they will come up with an alternative social event to keep their members happy.

What do they have to worry about anyway? They probably started the whole thing…or perhaps not. Who knows though? 

FACT 1: Though we have made it perfectly clear that the authorities as a whole are not to be trusted during an apocalypse, there is usually one member of each group who is plucky, courageous and willing to help (they’re usually new to the department so haven’t had time to be poisoned with cynicism and machismo). If you must go to the authorities try and link up with this one person.

FACT 2: All research regarding the authorities’ reaction to the rising of the dead has been taken from varying filmic sources and is probably in no way connected to how they will react in real life. For all we know they already have a secret zombie plan that will save us all when the dead rise – but how can I comment on that if they insist on keeping it a secret? If they just told us the truth now and then and were a little bit more transparent then maybe they wouldn’t be depicted as Hitlerian egomaniacs or shambling goons in every zombie film that has ever been made.

B

BACTERIA

In 1998 an American scientist calculated that the number of bacteria on earth was 5,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. One can assume from this man’s findings that:

in over ten years this figure has increased andthis man never got much sex.

So, how will this very long number affect us when attempting to survive a zombie apocalypse? Bacteria will be both our best friend and possibly our worst enemy during these dark times.

There are good bacteria and there are bad bacteria (for proof of this, speak to Mr Yakult). Unfortunately, we are more likely to encounter the bad bacteria (the likes of which cause tetanus, typhoid fever, diphtheria, syphilis, cholera, food-borne illness, leprosy, tuberculosis and other life-threatening illnesses) than the good bacteria (like Lactobacillus and Lactococcus that make cheese).

With society on its knees, medicines are going to become scarce so we will be more susceptible. There is not much you can do about this other than to take simple precautions such as: ensuring you and your sanctuary are kept clean; if you do suffer injuries, attempt to sterilise them; and if food begins to spoil get rid of it. Should you, however, discover a way in which to destroy all bacteria I implore you – DON’T. Bacteria is also our greatest natural asset in the war against zombies. It is bacteria that makes them rot.

Although this may seem like a rather time-consuming way to defeat the undead, bear in mind that given the right conditions (hotter climate) and with the help of insects, a human body can rot away to just bone in anywhere between 50 and 365 days. So, with the help of bacteria, it will all just be a case of bedding down and waiting for our inevitable victory! With a wine and cheese celebration afterwards.

BALD

This is the best way to present one’s head during a zombie apocalypse – and quite possibly the rest of your body too should you be a rather hirsute person. The reasoning behind this has less to do with fashion and more to do with giving a zombie as little as possible to grab on to should you be attacked. Zombies are known to fight like girls and will grab your hair, bite and quite possibly pinch you too if they have the chance.

Having no hair will also make you a faster swimmer – according to the Goodhew theory of aerodynamics.

BARRICADES

A barricade is what is needed when a door just won’t do the job on its own. If you have a large number of zombies to keep out then you need to pile as much stuff as possible in front of all the access points to make it as difficult as possible for them to get in. Furniture is the preferred item for use in a barricade.

Those of you who regularly watch TV will note that in situations when a barricade is needed, there is usually a well-placed chest of drawers or cabinet next to the door or window that needs blocking. Don’t rely on one being there when you need it. If you have decided to make an ultra-modern apartment building your sanctuary you might have noticed that the minimalist attitude of the previous tenants leaves you with very little furniture. This is where your inventiveness will have to come into play and you may be forced to use alternative items to create a barricade (e.g. books, clothes, fish – if the previous tenant had an aquarium). As long as you have enough of something, it will make an effective enough barricade.

Be aware that a barricade does not have to be placed in front of a door or window – you can also pile items onto stairs, making upper floors inaccessible, and down corridors, essentially blocking off segments of your safe house.

KEEPING YOUR BARRIER SAFE

As well as being effective at keeping zombies out, be aware that your barricade should also be easy to dismantle in case you need to get out of your safe house quickly.Never build a personal barricade by constructing four walls of furniture completely around yourself with a roof on top. Other survivors may mistake it for an unlit bonfire and then you will be in the same situation as hedgehogs on bonfire night.

BIRDS

Birds are around so much that in normal everyday life we rarely notice them. During an apocalypse, though, it is worth keeping an eye out for our feathered friends as they can tell us much about how safe an area is.

It is worth noting that evidence suggests zombies will attack any living creature. So we will presume that birds are also viable prey for the undead.

Pigeon

Pigeons are generally found living in urban areas and are known as the rodents of the bird world due to their habit of scavenging. They are also very intelligent and will become aware that zombies are a danger to them. You can therefore use them as an advance warning system. If you see a flock of pigeons suddenly take to the skies, then you can be assured that something has disturbed them and you can keep away from that area of town. The downside to this is that if a flock of pigeons was in that area, there was probably something worth eating. Make your choice! Stay or go – but the pigeons warned you.

Crow