Zombieblog

It’s been a pretty difficult week. Work is still kicking my ass and Christopher Hitchens moved on to his lack of reward. But there have been a couple high points too, I went out to the local Zombie Burger and got this:

Delicious.

How can food compare with struggling at work and the death of one of the world’s greatest thinkers? Pretty well actually. First the work thing. It’s not so much that I’m sucking (which I still am to a certain extent) but that I think I should be getting more done. I so hate being ‘that’ guy, you know the one, the one who can’t seem to keep up with his share of the work coming down the conveyor belt, so the other people have to ‘pitch in’ and help him out…a lot. If only I had a drinking problem to blame… Heh, heh, irony, ’cause if I had a drinking problem I probably wouldn’t be worried about my co-workers and them having to do my work for me. Anyhoo, that will get better.

As for Hitchens, well the prognosis isn’t good for a full recovery. Even a zombie Hitchens wouldn’t be the same. I knew he was ill, I viewed some of his youtube videos discussing it and I don’t think that brilliance will come around again for some time. Hitch, you are already missed!

Despite having absolutely no faith I sure do like Christmas, it is always good to get together with friends and family and give and get tokens of affection. I think I must have spent over three hundred at thinkgeek.com this year, they have amazing stocking stuffers and ‘real’ gifts too. I’d put down what I got, but you never know when a giftee will hit this sight unexpectedly, so it will have to wait until after the holiday. Overall I am still turned off by the rampant materialism of the season, but everyone, including me, can buy into that as much as we want, no one is forced to participate, though I do understand the social pressures that come from the giving frenzy.

Reading wise I’ve been chipping away at ‘Too Big to Fail’, a book about the financial crisis, very good if you’re into non-fiction. It’s nice to know the engineers of that catastrophe have almost all gotten off without penalty and that many of them have even been given jobs in our government to help regulate…the financial industry. Sweet. I’ll keep honing my zombie barricade building skills, they will work against post-apocalyptic raiders too.

Oh and I can’t leave without at least giving a shout out to that other aithiest who died last week too, Kim Jong Il, the world is probably better for your passing, but I know your poor country isn’t. I don’t always buy into the hype that other countries are ‘bad’ or ‘evil’, North Korea though, yeah, the evidence seems to point that way. Just head over to the officialThe Democratic People’s Republic of Korea website and take a read of the crazy for yourself sometime. Things like this make me very happy to live where I do and have the rights I do, even if the freedoms are restrained and under constant assault.

I’ve often wondered what it would be like to live further north. Or in the extreme south, or even at one of the bases near the south pole. The extreme climate and endless darkness sort of appeal to me, a place where the sun never rises, or sets, I suppose if I went at the opposite time of the year. Here where I live the daylight gets down to about 8 hours a day at winter solstice and I’m pretty sure that is my favorite time of the year. Don’t get me wrong, fall is good, spring is good, some parts of summer are good, I LIKE all times of the year, but darkness just stimulates my imagination more.

I can see a windswept plain, where the werewolves and vampires come bounding at me from all sides, tearing the small people apart while we fight for survival. Throw a few necromancers (undoubtedly of a fey origin, just to keep things inhuman) with a marauding band of zombies in there and I think things would be perfect. Regular folks wouldn’t make a wood palisade to hide behind, I mean, that would just be calling attention to themselves, wouldn’t it? No they would hide in the cracks, in the hidden places they had prepared months in advance, maybe behind a cave bear or under the ice in some sort of cave at constant risk of being destroyed by the shifting whim of nature. I wouldn’t give humanity good odds of survival in my mind.

Writing goes well these days, Cayo Elina is leaps and bounds beyond what I have posted at Ctales, due to my not working on any other projects and I’m pleased that I should have it finished in the next week or so. After that I’m tempted to go on hiatus for awhile, drop the website, stop writing for a bit and just do a little thinking, aka, goofing off. I’m not sure, but I know one thing; I won’t be able to stick to my guns, I will write. These days I can’t help it.

So the grill gave up the ghost last weekend. It is, ironically, a warm weather grill. I’m pretty sure that the problem lies with the regulator, that wee little thing that prevents too much propane from shooting out of the tank and turning your grill into flame thrower at best or a bomb at worst. I enjoy not having to think about that when I’m out there grilling and can appreciate the fact that when I turn on the grill I don’t need to worry about blowing up too much. I think the next grill I buy is going to be a step up from where I am at now.

The last grill had a defect and the lid burned off of it. If you’ve never seen a metal composite burn, well, let me tell you, it is amazing. Not so good when your siding starts to go up due to the heat, but definitely a sight you won’t forget. It was like a little mini-sun right there on the man deck. I had a lot of family around that evening and we got the thing out and I even salvaged some of the ribs, but all in all I said then that I would buy a better grill next time around. Wouldn’t you know it that cheap grill was sort of developing a habit of ‘lid burning’ and the manufacturer was handing out new ones to people who lost them. That’s how I got my current cheap grill. A vow unfulfilled because of the expediency of ‘free’.

I think this coming year is going to see an outpouring of cash on my part. It has been a while since I’ve had any major calamities and I feel the cold winds of disharmony blowing the stinkin’ winds of ‘kick in the balls’ my way. Hopefully I get the grill before my money gets sucked into car and house repairs. I mean if you’re staring a $3000 repair in the face it’s nicer to do so over a bit of charred meat.