Category: Writer’s Blog

I’ve written about the storytelling technique of Chekhov’s Gun in several past blogs, but here, a quick refresher:

What a twelve months or so it’s been. It was around this time last year that we were realizing the extent of a bedbug infestation in our home/studio and put the comic on pause for our longest ever hiatus while we turned everything upside down and inside out to get rid of it, just in time for Zombie Ranch‘s tenth anniversary of publication.

In other words I guess we started our 2020 early, in terms of upheavals. We finally put our lives back together, restarted the comic and got in one convention, the Long Beach Comic Expo… and then Covid-19 hit. Conventions started postponing and/or canceling, culminating in San Diego Comic-Con itself pulling the plug. And 2020 wasn’t done yet, with our latest but not least anxiety being the encroaching Bobcat wildfire which is burning perilously close to us and filling our air with smoke. Ah, and we had a moderate earthquake this last Friday night, just to add to the sense of “Oh COME ON!”

I remember when the pandemic was gathering steam in March I remarked that a webcomic at least would be one of the things least impacted, but of course I wasn’t reckoning with the mental and physical health of your humble proprietors. Thankfully y’all have been wonderfully patient as readers, and I suppose I can count my blessings we never got big enough with this project to quit our day jobs because all the convention cancellations have been infinitely worse for several of the folks we know who made a large part of their living doing the circuit.

Just about everyone’s hurting in some way or other, it seems, and although we haven’t been shy about taking our rest when we need it, when we do get the comic out it’s good to hear from you folks that you’re engaged and enjoying and getting a breath of escapism from our efforts, even if only for a few fleeting moments. We can all certainly use it.

So let’s continue the discussion on dialog, because why not? A lot of people struggle with it. Any help those of us who don’t struggle with it (or don’t struggle as much) is probably welcome, assuming we can express our assistance properly.

That part’s the rub, isn’t it? Last week I talked about how I’ve been writing all my life, over and over and over, but it seems like the greatest cop-out to tell someone having trouble to “just write.” Again I’ll equate it to the thought of Dawn telling me to “just draw.” Some more guidance than that would be appreciated, wouldn’t it?

But when you’re so familiar with something, you have to go back and take it apart and try to figure out some of the underlying things that you think would help a newbie. These past few weeks I’ve been attempting to do that. So let’s talk a bit about what I’m just going to call “voice.”

Do you hear your characters’ voices in your head? You really should. In fact, you might even want to speak your dialog aloud and see how it sounds. In the early days of Star Wars Harrison Ford is supposed to have famously told its creator, “George, you can write this shit but you sure can’t say it.”

Do all your characters sound the same? They shouldn’t. True, groups of close friends will often develop a certain unifying vernacular, but if everyone’s just a generic quip machine that’s going to ring hollow after awhile. Quirks of speech aren’t just for determining who’s talking from off-panel, they can be downright crucial in establishing a sense of verisimilitude for a reader. Nothing’s worse for me than a bunch of twelve-year-olds talking like they were 35. You might even need to go listen to some actual twelve-year-olds for a refresher.

I don’t want to say this isn’t hard, because for someone having trouble with it it’s of course going to be hard. So maybe start with the broad strokes, so to speak. Extreme characters and extreme situations… how would Characters A and B respond to Character C’s declaration of a risky plan?

Character A: “Have you quite taken leave of your senses?!”

Character B: “Dude! Are you nuts?”

Without even seeing them represented on a page, these characters have formed a picture of who they are in your mind’s eye just by virtue of their words, haven’t they? So maybe do that several more times. Take one of your characters and imagine what they might say when threatened… when exhausted… when in love. Then take another character and do the same. Now put them together and let those different reactions interact. It’s alchemy of a sort, to be sure, but writers have been rediscovering the formula over many centuries, so I have a feeling you can, too.

So I believe I’ve mentioned that Dawn’s been (off and on) trying to write some comic scripts of her own, and this is where I’ve discovered certain faults of mine as a coach. Writing, especially writing dialogue, just seems to come naturally to me, and any time that’s the case it can be difficult to explain to someone else for whom it’s not as simple. I want to equate it to how it would be if I asked Dawn to teach me to draw faces.

But then again any pro or semi-pro artist I’ve ever talked to, including Dawn, will tell you that drawing isn’t a matter of talent but of lots and lots of practice. Is it the same with writing? I’ve been in love with words nearly all my life but it’s not like I’m going through every paragraph I type over and over…

Except, just now I backspaced and retyped that sentence about three times, and also realized it’s not really a sentence but evaluated the use of ellipses and decided to give a middle finger to Strunk & White because hell, it’s still a perfectly coherent thought being communicated.

That’s a lot of thinking about a few words, isn’t it? I also have a habit of going back and editing things as fleeting as Facebook posts as I think of better ways to get my point across. Meanwhile one of the big reasons I never got into Twitter much was the inability to edit after the fact. Everything on Twitter is a first draft. It can be figuratively crumpled up and deleted (assuming no one has screenshotted it in the meantime) but it can’t be revised.

I just went back and edited that second paragraph because on re-reading it I felt it had one too many uses of the word “over.”

These blogs are something I consider highly informal, even disposable. Now try to imagine what I do with a composition I feel needs to be as perfect as it can be.

The more I think about it the more I realize what an immense lifetime’s worth of prose I’ve composed, even if most of it will never see publication. Before the advent of graphical MMORPG’s I was an active participant in text-based multi-user roleplaying and I’ve recently poked at some old log files of play all the way back in 2002, and you know what? They hold up. I’m impressed with that Clint guy’s writing, much of which was improvisational and needed to be typed in real time within the span of a couple of minutes so that your scene partner(s) didn’t get horribly bored with you.

I was having a great time, too, but now I’m wondering if it’s part of why I can rattle character dialog for Zombie Ranch off my keyboard with nary a hesitation. No secret method. Just practice, practice, practice.

It’s my birthday week, and as a birthday present Dawn at long last finished up an edit of another memorable “horde night” during our group play of 7 Days to Die. After the disastrous encounter that nearly leveled our first home, we sought out something sturdier for the next blood moon romp. The roof of a “Shamway” supermarket building made of solid concrete and stone beckoned, and we set up our defenses, now prepared for the worst the zombies could possibly throw at us…

…or so we thought. This time around Dawn spliced together three different feeds from her, me, and our friend Shawn, and although mine came out somewhat choppy I think she did a pretty good job of capturing the chaos. It’s all fun and games until 2am…

Oh and once again: NSFW unless your workplace is a sailor’s tavern or somesuch. You have been warned.

More than seven years ago(!) I wrote a blog where I discussed sound effects in comics. I know because I was going to wittily(?) title this blog “The Sounds of Silence” before it occurred to me to check if I’d already done that.

Sigh. Keep writing nearly every week for long enough and you’ll repeat yourself. I suppose at least I haven’t reached the point where I’ve stopped caring about whether or not I’m repeating myself.

Anyhow, where was I? Oh yes, comic book sound effects. Every creator reaches those points where they decide whether a given panel of their comic is going to have a visible sound effect or not. Some never do this. Some indulge only rarely. Some fill their pages with all manner of BIFFBAMPOW BUDDABUDDA. The thing is, there’s another level once you commit to “making a noise” and that’s: what noise do I make?

What combination of letters best represents glass breaking? Or an axe chopping into wood? Or a gun firing?

And then because it’s comics, there’s even this unique question: what does that noise look like?

And then one last question: the next time this sound happens in my comic, will it be the same?

For consistency’s sake it should be, right?

The representation of sound can be very subjective, but I’ve recently been pondering a certain decision I made way back when, and that’s the sound Oscar’s AK-47 makes when it fires, which I put down as various variations of BRR-RRR-RRT and I’ve stuck with that ever since.

But damn, every time I hear an AK-47 firing these days I think, “Wow it doesn’t sound like BRR-RRR-RRT at all.” Yet here I am still doing it that way because consistency.

If I changed it up would people notice? Or care? Am I indulging in a version of the sunk cost fallacy where I keep on with something that’s foolish (or at least is currently bothering me) because I feel like it’s too late to change?

Yeah, hardly the kind of stuff that keeps most people up at night. It’s not really keeping me up at night either, to be honest, but sometimes it’s good to get it out there and hear what others think.

Comics is (with some experimentation aside) a silent medium, that is to say… well, that we don’t hear what they say. Characters “talk” by way of printed words on the page and what voice they have is pieced together in the reader’s mind. It shares this feature with prose, which occasionally makes for a jarring audio book experience as the person you’ve spent years “hearing” one way turns out to have a very different interpretation in the author’s head.

Zombie Ranch is in no way immune to this. I write the characters with a definite voice for each because I feel it’s very important to get their particular cadence and personality across even if the end result still depends on a reader’s interpretation. Actually check that, it’s more than a feeling, it’s a downright necessity. Why? Off-panel dialogue.

The recent pages have been indulging in this a lot, and I’m hoping it hasn’t been a confusing mess to try to parse out. Off-panel dialogue means the “balloon” is coming from a source not depicted in the panel itself, and without an actual voice to hear it can be tricky to clue the reader in as to who the source is. I do have several tricks up my sleeve in regards to this, for example…

…using ellipses to chain together dialogue between a panel where the source is pictured and where they are not. This may not be a grammatically proper method but I think it definitely helps to indicate a continuation of speech. On the other hand there are times I still use ellipses as a “trailing off” indicator as well, which would be the exact opposite (a stoppage of speech). Are readers getting confused by that? I don’t hear complaints, but it’s possible people are just being polite and/or not feeling it worth complaining about for a free webcomic. Understandable. Commendable, even.

But still, I do try. My other main cheat is names, but it’s easy to overuse that. People don’t tend to constantly call each other by name during a conversation. Except when they do, like the Sheriff’s particular habit of constantly wanting to check in with Jimmy.

and  other main way is like I said above, giving (or at least trying to give) each character an individual voice. Voices for the voiceless. As noted above it’s a happy byproduct of something I’m already doing. “Shitfire” is an epithet that only gets used by Suzie (and her late lamented pa), so if that’s part of an off-panel dialogue that would be a big raging clue that Suzie’s the source. Oscar is the only one who calls Frank “chief” and Suzie “big boss” as go-to nicknames. Lacey has her “yugh” and “HO-lee crap!”. Iphigenia Langhorne calls everyone “darling” like it’s going out of style. Frank’s speech is as clipped and to the point as The Exec’s is long-winded and sociopathically philosophical. Deputy Jimmy likes to rhyme a lot of the time. Eustace has a bit of a stutter and every statement he makes tends to sound like a plea. Brett… well Brett’s a bit slow on the uptake, if you catch my drift (he probably didn’t).

Some of these characters have never met and quite possibly never will, so it’s not as important to be able to distinguish between them. For those closer at hand, all these little verbal tics and cadences hopefully serve as a “who’s who” guide when the balloon tails have a point, but don’t show where they’re pointing.

Well, not really, I’m not feeling my poetic urges quite this moment. But hey, as apocalypse digs go this is pretty nice, right? Come home from a terrifying night of zombie survival, kick back with a homemade brewski and pretend to watch some television?

I started a new single-player game of 7 Days to Die trying out their latest development build and lo and behold, zoned in just down the way from a most cozy trailer, complete with that most comfy couch. I have since decided that this couch must be protected at all costs, not least because although the game does have some furniture building options, this particular couch is not one of them. If it gets destroyed, ’tis gone forever.

But nice setup, eh? A lot of this is unchanged from when I invited myself to move in (after dealing with a long-dead owner and his equally long-dead dog). The outer walls were solid metal and the interior had enough working electric lights that I didn’t have to install any heat generating (and thus zombie attracting) candles or torches. Oh yeah, and a reinforced iron door for an entrance at a time when you’re still scrounging around trying to put together stone tools.

Anyhow, now I’ve got some viable trailer living going! I even knocked a hole in the roof to better simulate Chuck’s demesne, and incidentally the roof is a great place to shoot the shambling neighbors from should they come by and raise a ruckus.

Mind you, I don’t have the confidence this would stand up to one of them thar Blood Moon hordes and don’t want to risk that couch trying! So I’ve got a “horde base” set up a ways down the road. On the roof of a former strip club called “The Boobie Trap.”

Yeah, it’s just a Chuck-friendly world. Good thing, too, ‘cuz otherwise it ain’t very friendly at all.

“Virtually spotless” was how the dish detergent brand Cascade described its cleaning power on glassware. If you’re pausing right now and thinking that’s a functionally meaningless claim to make, congratulations, you have recognized the advertising trick known as the weasel word. Weasel words make statements sound great without leaving an advertiser on the hook legally when someone finds their wine glasses still have some spots on them. Similar statements like “helps,” for instance “helps prevent cavities” on a mouthwash or toothpaste might also render a claim suspect.

We grow up surrounded by a lot of bullshit and it helps to keep that in mind. You like Froot Loops? Cool, but don’t fool yourself that it’s good for you. “Part of this complete breakfast”? — I mean sure, once you add in the toast, milk, juice, actual fruit, peanut butter… matter of fact, at that point you could just pull the cereal right out of the mix and still have a complete breakfast, couldn’t you? It’s part of your complete breakfast the way parsley is part of your steak dinner. But they’re not lying.

That’s the trick, you know. If they could get away with outright lying to you, they would, as evidenced by the fact that labeling meat as Kobe Beef is a restricted thing in Japan but remains largely unregulated in the U.S.A., so there’s a lot of chicanery involved with basically presenting beef to a consumer that’s got a premium price for nothing more than a four-letter word.

Most of the time though there are laws cramping an advertiser’s style and so it’s time for the weaseling or other techniques preying on a buyer’s ignorance. Ever heard the term “parity product”? That’s something that has no real difference to it no matter who’s selling it to you, and one of the most famous examples is gasoline. Don’t get me wrong, octane ratings are a real thing, but if the octane is the same then it really doesn’t matter and you should be looking for the cheapest available. Yet millions are spent convincing you that you should go to this particular station and pay a dollar or more extra per gallon because their gas helps clean your engine. Which is true, gasoline is a natural solvent. All gasoline.

This technique is sometimes called “water is wet!” because an advertiser is basically saying they have something special going even though it’s just a common feature. It’s trying to get you really excited because their brand of pen contains ink. Or as a recent example, there are packs of beef jerky proudly advertised as “gluten free!” Which, yes, that does tend to be a feature of meat.

Anyhow, the phrase caveat emptor has been around for thousands of years for a reason. Buyer beware, indeed.

Ever watched an old movie or television show featuring “future” technology and chuckled because, for example, they considered a phone that didn’t need to be plugged into a wall to be a big deal?

Some things like Star Trek‘s replicators or transporters remain the realm of science fiction, but other speculative fiction often falls prey to the march of time. No one’s reanimating dead tissue a la Dr. Frankenstein yet (that I know of, anyhow), but Jules Verne’s flight of fancy about massive submersible vehicles of war didn’t take long to become a reality. Speaking of reanimating tissue, though…

https://mashable.com/article/kfc-3d-printed-chicken-nuggets/

American fast food chain KFC has announced plans to debut 3D printed chicken nuggets made from a mix of plant matter and meat grown in a lab. In other words, basically meat cloned from chicken cells. That sort of tech is something we posited for the Zombie Ranch world seeing as livestock is mostly a memory of the past, and now here it is in the, err, flesh.

Honestly, this sort of thing makes me wonder if the replicators aren’t too far-fetched, after all? No breakthrough on those transporters, though, so figure on still getting from place to place the hard way for the foreseeable future.

I feel like this has become a 7 Days to Die blog of late, but uh… sorry not sorry? Listen, I have to tell you I started a new single player game intending to do an Uncle Chuck simulator after seeing how much the game emphasizes scavenging anything that’s not nailed down… and then there’s that old adage that it’s only nailed down if you don’t have a proper tool to remove nails. You can walk into just about any place and–given enough time and gumption–strip it down to the ground for spare parts. I mean, assuming you don’t attract a hungry horde with all the racket you’re making, but that’s why the cosmos gave us shotguns, right?

There are trailer parks in the game, but I must admit that’s not where Chuck ended up settling, not when I stumbled upon a former old-timey funeral home complete with walled-in graveyard that was conveniently close to a trading outpost. You might think this would be the last place to hole up in a zombie apocalypse, but once those graves were cleared out they made for nice, naturally nutrient rich planters in which to grow a protected herb garden.

Meanwhile the home itself needed some renovations and reinforcement, but the stairway access makes for a nice choke point against unwanted solicitations, particularly with some spiked trenching beneath. Just gotta watch that jump!

Still a work in progress, naturally, but it started out all in wood and will hopefully be concrete around the bottom by the time the exploders start showing up. Also note all the additions for gettin’ around so Chuck can shoot, throw molotovs, etc. from a relatively safe vantage point.

Meanwhile the trees I planted around the pond nearby have grown into a nice forest for wood farming, which is otherwise not so easy in the desert. What a picturesque patch of green, eh?

So that’s just a taste of all the landscaping and refurbishing you can get up to as you try to perfect your holdout. Mind you the game will do its level best to level it, but after a few horde nights survived it’s been so far, so good, even though I’m all on my own. Just gotta keep ahead of the curve. The electric fences I just got installed should help with that…

Oh and Chuck wanted me to be sure to mention the best selling point of the property, which was admittedly not even noticed until after the initial clearing and surveying because I first approached from the side opposite the sign. No modification needed, there. Perfection.

In my review of 7 Days to Die last week I talked about how the name of the game largely comes from the mechanic that, by default, the game is set so that every seven days of in-game time a “blood moon” event occurs, where as the sun goes down in a blood-red sky, hordes of frenzied zombies will stop their random shambling and instead make a full assault your safe house as you and your friends try desperately to hold them off. If you manage that, you have another seven days to repair, scavenge, explore and prep before they’ll be back again, even stronger than before. They might even bring along some new friends to mess with your battle plan. You’ll also keep respawning on death so long as your bedroll remains intact… but you may wish you didn’t.

Given the swiftness of zombies on blood moon night, it seemed appropriate for Dawn to capture and edit a video of our experiences of the fourth assault, i.e. “28 days later.” Massive spoilers of course, but now I know all-too-well what the commenter last week meant about finding a second base to avoid damage to the main one. Yikes.

A few caveats — we have some mods and adjustments in place for our server (like we don’t drop items on death, which would have led to a lot of bare-handed punching). The game is still in early access so there are some notable glitches, like Anthony ending up stuck floating his way through most of the video. Also this is VERY DEFINITELY NSFW or for any other environment sensitive to colorful language. Let’s just say panic mode doesn’t lend itself well to bowdlerized utterances like “shucks” and “dang.”

Also also: Dawn + shotgun + panic = teamkill shenanigans.

Remember not so long ago when it seemed like you couldn’t throw a digital stick without hitting some sort of zombie apocalypse video game? And that included a handful of attempts at an MMO, such as H1Z1 and Day Z. I remember not being terribly impressed with either of those efforts, and that was before they seemed to all but abandon their zombie experience in favor of jumping on the PvP Battle Royale bandwagon.

Well, anyhow fast forward to this past weekend when the Steam Summer Sale coughed up the suggestion of 7 Days to Die on my store feed. $8.49, or $13.59 for a 2-copy special with an extra for a friend to play. Still marked as “early access” but what the hell, for that price I decided to buy the 2-for-1 and give it a whirl, especially since I’d recently heard an endorsement giving praise to its building features.

Now apparently this game has been in early access status since 2013, which I didn’t know at the time and sounds really bad. However, I guess in 2020 we can call that seven years to live? Because whatever it might have been before, at the moment it’s become a fairly solid experience.

Before I go on, let me digress and talk about Fallout 4 for a moment, in particular its base building features. They were an endless source of frustration for me because one of my favorite post-apoc genre things is seeing survival forts adapted out of existing buildings of the “old world.” But Fallout’s existing structures were often not easy to build off of, or unavailable for building, or also often indestructible so you couldn’t modify or remove them. Various mods attempted to address these issues but they all had to wrestle with a system that from the ground up was very limited and unfriendly to alteration. When (courtesy of mods like the excellent Sim Settlements) I was able to get some semi-good compounds going, the occasional AI raid felt lackluster, to the point I eventually would end up doing things like cheat spawning a group of Deathclaws just to see how my defenses held up against them.

So far nearly everything in 7 Days to Die I’ve run across can be built upon or destroyed, including the very ground itself which you can dig into in order to create trenches, pits and even tunnels. The exceptions would be the “land claim” area of another player (though this can be solved by allying with them) and the NPC trader compounds dotted around the map. In addition to buying and selling those NPC traders can also give various quests which felt familiar to me as a Star Wars Galaxies veteran: go to this spot and clear it out/retrieve items/dig for treasure, then come back and be rewarded with XP, loot and “Duke Coins” — casino chips which have become de facto coin of the realm.

The attribute and perks system in leveling up will be familiar to Fallout players, though instead of a global “gunsmithing” skill, for example, crafting of weapons is locked to each weapon skill tree, like brass knuckles under Brawling. Fortunately there are also skill books you can find out in the wilds, as well as just plain breaking into an abandoned gun safe to find a high-quality boomstick. The catch, of course, is that you have to explore to find those, and exploring means zombies.

Not that staying put doesn’t have its own complications. You need to constantly be on the lookout for food and water, and anything that’s not sealed in a can has a chance to make you sick, though doing things like boiling the water from that murky river first helps. Meanwhile it can get really dark at night but lighting torches and campfires, in addition to other non-subtle activities like chopping down trees can raise the invisible “heat map” of a given area. Over time if that gets over a certain threshold, the Undead Home Owner’s Association might send a shambling representative by your property, and if they find you they may call in a group of your unfriendly neighbors. On the other hand, it’s still a good idea to hole up somewhere when the sun goes down, because by default settings the slow shamblers of the daytime become sprinters at night (you can alter this for a more Romero-esque experience if you wish, it’s still plenty scary in my opinion when you can’t frickin’ see or are searching the tight corridors of a wrecked hospital).

Everything is destructible given enough time and persistence, and we all know how persistent zed can be when he’s hungry. So if he starts banging on your door or even your bricked-up wall, you’d best deal with him before he gets in or at least weakens it for the next guest. On the plus side, you can make holes and break stuff, too. Can I knock out an upstairs window and then use it as a balcony entrance for a catwalk around the upper part of the house? Yes I can! Can I bust out a flimsy doorframe and block it with cubes of solid iron (again breakable, but not at all easily)? Yep, that too. Dig pits and fill them with zombie-skewering spikes? Yep, just watch you don’t fall in yourself. You can see some of the alterations we’ve made, like part of the catwalk and also window bars and spikes in the photo at the top of the blog. A land claim also isn’t technically required to build, either. I spent a night once in a treehouse out in an abandoned town and was able to take wood from the tree it was built in to make a catwalk bridge to reach the the roof of a house across the way.

But ideally you want somewhere to return to with decent defenses in place. And boy, will they ever be tested. Even without PvP involved this game is deadly and moments of inattention or arrogance can get you killed, or worse, infected. Yes, zombies and zombie animals(!) have a chance to transfer their dread disease to your person any time they hit you. You can lessen the chance by wearing armor (styled in an appropriate Mad Max aesthetic of course) but once you contract it the slow counter starts and you got about seven in-game days before you die. Oddly enough antibiotics are a cure for this, but you can go a long time without finding any of those and meanwhile your stats will slowly get worse and worse, provided you don’t just go for suicide or your buddies decide on assisted suicide. You’ll resurrect healthy at your bedroll (minus your stuff and maybe some XP) and it doesn’t seem like your old body gets back up hungry in those cases. Of course I haven’t yet seen the results of the infection running its course completely…

Anyhow, you might think that infection time is why the game is called 7 Days to Die.

Well, uh, there’s also this thing called the Blood Moon Night.

When the sun goes down on the seventh day, a terrifying horde will descend upon you and you’d best be prepared. I don’t want to spoil the experience too much but trust me when I say it’s some white-knuckle shit. Survive that and you’ve got another seven days to repair and prepare, but unless you (and maybe others on the server) have been dying a lot the “gamestage” level will likely have risen and it’ll be worse. Let’s just say on Day 7 they didn’t even get in to our safehouse. On Day 14 I was fighting the last wave off in our living room with the benefit of pain drugs and a set of bloody brass knuckles, and that was after running my AK-47 dry and using two out of three grenades that I had not intended to have to use.

The days go by frighteningly fast once you realize the cycle of doom you’re locked into. In the aftermath of Day 14 we have plans for dealing with Day 21 but if we can’t get our hands on more ammo — like, a lot more ammo — we’re gonna have a bad time.

But we’re also having a great time, because this is probably the closest we’ve ever come to having the immersion of an all-around zombie apocalypse experience in game form. It’s been well worth that Steam Sale price tag and the sale is still on through tomorrow (July 9) if any of this tickles your fancy. I highly recommend buying the 2-for-1 deal so you can gift one to a friend who can watch your back.

Oh and did I mention the abandoned Wild West town that’s part of the default map (representing the fictional Navezgane County, Arizona)? It’s like they know me…

One of American Founding Father Benjamin Franklin’s more famous quotes goes as such:

“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”

I’ve often heard the first part paraphrased as “a little liberty” which doesn’t leave much wriggle room versus “essential liberty.” Then you end up looking into it further and find out we mostly use it way out of its original context.

I can’t help but wonder if Franklin ever had to live through a global pandemic? Then again, now that I’ve looked up the quote again for this blog it seems that we mostly use it out of its intended context, anyhow. It sounds great as an anti-tyranny statement but was originally mostly about making sure certain rich people paid their taxes.

And even if we apply it to its 20th/21st Century context, well, there’s still some room for soul-searching as to why being asked to wear a face mask is giving up an “essential Liberty.” Especially now that the worst is (predictably) coming true and America’s laissez-faire attitude towards Covid-19 is causing its resurgence in a big way.

We shouldn’t have rushed to reopen so soon, and it’s perhaps even more tragic that here in California all signs were that we were getting it under control and then we had to go and screw it up right along with the administrations that never seemed to take it seriously at all. Now everything’s getting shut down again but according to the CDC, it’s too late.

At very least I don’t honestly know how anyone thought reopening bars was a workable idea. We still know comparatively little about how the disease operates but we do know that the most surefire scenario for contracting it is to be in an enclosed area with a lot of people for an an hour or two, particularly if they’re doing something like singing or shouting and aren’t wearing masks so that their exhalations flow free. That humid feeling you get in crowded nightclubs and bars? That’s human breath and sweat in the air. And the whole “be cautious and observe social distancing” protocol? That’s not going to survive much past a few drinks.

I’m not laying all the blame at the door of the far right, either. They might be the most vocal figurehead for denial and you’ve got some really fringe elements that apparently consider not spitting on the produce aisle in the supermarket an unforgivable affront to their freedom, but there has been plenty of stupid to go around on all points of the political spectrum. People in my own family that I would hardly describe as ragingly conservative have been getting manicures and haircuts. It’s more than disappointing to me, it legitimately terrifies me for their safety, no matter how otherwise careful they assure me they’re being.

I get it, to a point. I’ve always hated wearing a mask, even though I’ve suffered from allergies all my life. They’re uncomfortable and they tend to fog up my glasses. But you can breathe in them. Wearing one isn’t going to weaken your immune system from “disuse,” which is an actual statement I’ve heard people say in all seriousness. Trust me, we’re filthy creatures, our immune systems are constantly getting a workout whether or not we’re letting people cough in our faces. It’s such a little thing, and yet we can’t even do that much? If ever there was a time to give up a little liberty for some temporary safety, this was it. I’m past done with anyone downplaying the threat or insisting the “cure is worse than the disease” or any of that hogwash.

Anyhow, if ever I found the trope far-fetched of the guy hiding his zombie bite from the other survivors, putting everyone at risk because he figured nah, he won’t really be affected despite all observation to the contrary… here we are with a scenario where the worst that happens isn’t that you get shot in the head or exiled, you just get asked to leave the store.

Well, the worst that happens is you contribute to the spread of a deadly pandemic America could have stopped in its tracks like New Zealand, South Korea, and other countries managed to. As the ICU beds fill up, are we ready to admit we have a problem, and that the curve has not, in fact, flattened? Or will this weekend’s 4th of July celebrations be Memorial Day all over again?

For my part, I’ll be celebrating my liberty to turn down the BBQ invites. And I’m pretty sure that in these circumstances, Franklin would’ve worn a mask.

Welcome to yet another entry in my “I didn’t check this out until now but it’s intriguing so I thought I’d share even though I’m likely the last to know” files: Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts.

It’s a Netflix series so it’s not necessarily targeted towards children, but after a couple of episodes I would say that’s the sort of vibe I’m getting. I don’t think kids are stupid, mind you, but they’re much more likely to roll with the idea that 200 years after an undefined end of civilization-as-we-know-it, buildings are crumbling away but the clothing and musical instruments in the stores they house are perfectly intact.

It might be explained later, I don’t know, only two episodes in so far… if it’s not, ah well, it’s still a lot of fun and obviously not meant to be taken overly seriously. The ruined cityscape the show takes place in definitely seems to have once been Los Angeles, but our titular Vault-Dweller… err, sorry, “Burrower” Kipo has been flushed unexpectedly from her underground home and must try to find her way back through a landscape of colorful mutants and even more colorful human remnants. Humans are scarce up top and it’s hinted there’s a sinister reason for that having to do with some of the more antagonistic and intelligent animals, like the Mod Frogs who wear immaculate suits and behave like mafiosos. Or at the conclusion of the last episode we watched, a gang of man-sized beavers in lumberjack garb. I remarked to Dawn at this point that it was like watching The Warriors crossed with Fallout crossed with Animal Farm, but skewed towards a pre-teen audience.

Anyhow, it’s nicely animated and hey, post-apocalypse fare for all ages is a rare enough thing to intrigue, although any oldsters like me that remember Thundarr the Barbarian airing on Saturday mornings knows it can exist. Plus, and I suppose this might be embarrassing to admit… I didn’t know it until I looked it up but Kipo is based on a webcomic of the same name by its creator, Radford Sechrist. Hopefully it ends up better in transition than Axe Cop did, but so far, so good.

Ever watched a film where the villain has the hero at their mercy, but instead of finishing them off they have to stop and gloat for a few precious seconds? During which something inevitably happens to turn the tables, at best leading to the hero’s escape and at worst causing the villain’s demise and the undoing of their entire plot?

I always scoffed at such scenarios, and yet several years back I was part of an RPG session where the Gamemaster had me representing the antagonist character in opposition to the other players, and it happened. I got so into it and was so convinced of my own motives for doing all the terrible things I was doing and somehow at the climactic moment I had to pause and try to explain. It wasn’t gloating! But somehow I genuinely just felt this irrational conviction that if I could just persuade them to see things my way, they’d join me, or at least cease trying to stop me. So what if it all hinged on the murder of an innocent woman who was the betrothed of their leader? If they would just listen for a minute, I could…

Oh, and now I’m dead and my plans are ruined. Oops.

It’s a reminder that even the most cartoonish supervillains can still think of themselves as the heroes. Come on, Luke, join me and we can rule the galaxy together. Don’t make me destroy you.

Maybe it’s a holdover of tribal days, but there just seems to be something in human character where we want to be understood. Hell, we’ll even spend days arguing with ourselves that such-and-such was necessary, or so-and-so was clearly in the wrong in that confrontation, even though we have no audience. And if we’re fortunate enough to have friends to vent to, we’re not really interested in hearing the wrong answer to a posed question of “am I the asshole?” We want to feel justified. Ideally we’d want everyone to admit we were right, especially our antagonists. Defeating them is good, of course, but if they would also see that your way is correct that would be all the better.

So nasty people write memoirs, and shadowy executives record audio logs, and villains explain their evil plans as the laser slowly makes its way towards James Bond’s crotch… and sometimes that leaves the audience scratching their heads and wondering why they even bothered.

Well, turns out we might just be funny little creatures that like to talk. And to be understood. Even if it kills us.

Paraphrased lines from The Terminator aside, artificial intelligence still has a way to go before it approaches true human cognition (at which point I’m also confident it will develop human neuroses, which is either terrifying or reassuring depending on how I consider it).

In the meantime, behold the advent of the AI Game Master:

AI Dungeon

If you’re old enough like me to remember the glory days of Infocom and text-adventure computer games, the format of this free-to-play exercise will be familiar. You type sentences to interact with the game based on the setting and situation presented, and your choices lead you further and further into the adventure until you either achieve victory or suffer untimely defeat. Unlike those text games of yore, however, the reactions are not set results but based on AI algorithms that attempt as best as possible to process what you’re asking to do, or who you’re talking to, and respond accordingly. It’s like one of those chatbots, but more sophisticated and not just content to make small talk when there’s stories of heroes and monsters to be told.

What’s more, there are several genre selections available including the zombie apocalypse… so of course I chose that for a test run and decided to see how Chuck would do. There are no stats that I know of and I was presented with a character choice of Soldier, Scientist or Survivor, and though Chuck did his time in the military I figured he was more a Survivor at heart. After that the game plopped me right in and I started with the typing.

I’ve included the log below for your edutainment, and while you’ll definitely see the limits of the AI and the occasional action sequence or dialogue that makes no sense, I admit to being impressed at just how much it got right, like right from the get go where I typed “search for golf club” and it understood precisely. Also I must mention I wasn’t quite sure how to phrase things for the parser to understand as best as possible, and the game itself has “undo” and “refresh” functions designed to allow you to give the AI another chance at figuring out what you really meant.

Enough caveats, though. On with the Chuckness!

—————————————————————

You are Chuck, a survivor trying to survive in a world filled with infected zombies everywhere. You have a pistol and a backpack. You have managed to survive several months avoiding zombies and scavenging food. You cautiously enter a rundown store and hear the footsteps of a walker approaching from the backroom.
Your pistol is a simple gun you have found in a drawer at a destroyed store. It has five bullets.

> You find a golf club.
You find a wooden golf club in a corner of the store. It is extremely rotten, but it could be useful.
You are standing in the entrance of the store. There are two doors in front of you.

> You find some food.
You find some candy bars in a backpack in the corner of the store. They have a year of age, but they may be useful.
You are standing in the entrance of the store.

> You find some water.
You find a half-full bottle of water in a trash pile in the corner of the store. It could be useful.
You are standing in the entrance of the store.

> You find a crowbar.
You find a crowbar in a drawer in the store counter. It is extremely old and rusted, but it may be useful.
You are standing in the entrance of the store.

> You find ammo.
You find a box of ammo in a drawer in the store counter. It has a year of age, but it may be useful.
You are standing in the entrance of the store.

> You hide from walker.
You hide from a walking dead body. It can be seen through the window.
You are in a room with a bunch of old couches.
You notice a walker in the room.

> You search the couch for change.
You search the couch for change.
You find a quarters in the couch. It is extremely useful.
You are standing in the entrance of the store.
You see a newspaper rack in the corner of the room.

> You read a newspaper headline.
You read a newspaper headline.
You see a picture of a protest. There are a group of men standing in front of a sign that says: “HOPE”.

> You take the newspaper.
You take the newspaper.
You are about to leave the store, when suddenly you hear a sound.
It is a gun shot. Someone just shot a gun and startled you.

> You carefully investigate the gunshot.
You carefully investigate the gunshot.
You slowly walk to the counter in the store. You hear another gunshot. This one is much louder and closer than the last one.
Suddenly you feel a sharp pain in your neck.

> You dive for cover.
You dive for cover.
You dive for cover behind a counter in the store. You are hiding from the owner of the gun.

> You holler “Yow, watch where you’re shooting! I’m alive!”
You holler “Yow, watch where you’re shooting! I’m alive!”
The owner of the gun is standing behind the counter. He looks at you, then at the hole in his neck.

> You chuck raises his hands slowly. “Easy, pardner! Just scrounging for some comestibles. Want a candy bar?”
You chuckles. “I reckon I’m more of a eating kinda guy.”
You take out some change and give it to the owner.
“Thanks for the tip, friend,” he says.

> You find bandages.
You find bandages in the drawer of the counter. They are very useful.
You are in the back room of the store.
You go out the front door of the store.

> You bandage your neck wound.
You bandage your neck wound. You feel better now.
You are outside the store.
You see a bunch of zombies wandering around the parking lot.

> You look for a fire escape.
You look for a fire escape.
You notice a fire escape on the side of the building.
There is a guard standing next to the fire escape. He has a gun in his hands.

> You approach guard with hands where he can see them. “Howdy. Uh. Mind if I use your ladder? Lots of hungry shamblers out front.”
The guard nods, and points at a large ladder next to a bus. “You see it?”
You nod. “Perfect.”
You walk over to the ladder.
You show the guard your palms.

> You examine the bus.
You examine the bus.
The bus has a lot of space inside. There is a big driving wheel in the middle, and a bunch of seats along both sides.

> You search the bus carefully for walkers.
You search the bus carefully for walkers.
You walk down the aisle, slowly looking at each seat. You don’t see any.
You continue walking down the aisle. You are about halfway through the bus.

> You ready the golf club and continue searching the bus for walkers.
You ready the golf club and continue searching the bus for walkers.
You finish searching the bus. There are no walkers in the bus.
There is a knock at the side door of the bus.

> You go to the door. “Yello?”
You go to the door. “Yello?”
A man is standing outside the bus. He is holding a bright yellow backpack. There is a bright blue t-shirt wrapped around the bag.

> You chuckle heartily. “Need a ride? Hope you got exact change!”
The man chuckles. “No, thanks. I just started work at the college, so I need to get there fast. I can’t wait too long between stops.”
“OK. Glad to help,”

> You “The college? What you doing there?”
The man nods.

> You “Well come on board, this bus is clean far as I can tell.”
The man laughs, then nods. He begins walking down the aisle of the bus.
You motion him to the front seat.
“Thank you sir, oh joy.” He sits down.

> You check the ignition for keys.
You check the ignition for keys.
You see a bunch of keys hanging from the steering wheel.
You put the key in the ignition and turn it. The engine starts.

> You say “Holy crap, it’s still running!” Close the bus doors.
You say “Holy crap, it’s still running!” and close the bus doors.
The man gets up. “Thank you, sir. You just saved my life.

> You “De nada, pardner. Hey, seriously, let me give you a ride to that college. Which way is it?”
The man nods. “Thanks for the ride. I’ll make it up with a donation, sir.

> You drive to the college.
You drive to the college.
“Where do you think you’re going?” The guard says. “This is a private road, not public transportation.

> You chuck pats the side of the bus. “Well transportation don’t get much more public than a city bus. I got a passenger needs to get to work, if you’ll kindly allow.”
The guard laughs. “Sure thing, city boy. Hop on in, and make it quick, I got rounds to make.”
You climb on and sit down. “Thanks a lot, city boy.”

> You offer guard a jolly rancher. “I ain’t a city boy, exactly. Where you from?”
The guard looks at you, then opens the window. “A little town called Shamblers, if you want to know. You?”
“A nice-ish city called civilization,”

> You “‘Course, that place is long gone, isn’t it? I’m on my way back to my brother’s ranch.”
The guard nods. “Yeah, it’s been dead for a while now. I think it’s just a shadow of what it used to be, actually. If it ever was.”

> You “Yeah, the dang walkers ate all the cattle. I never thought I’d miss steak so much.”
The guard laughs. “Well, this is a hell of a lot better than being a guard back in Shamblers. You should come back with some supplies when you’re done. We could use some stuff.”

> You “Well I didn’t get too much today before some trigger happy gentleman grazed me in the neck. Calmed him down, but I decided to vamoose just in case.”
“Hm. Lot safer.”
You look out the window at the dead, featureless landscape. Everything has been turned into one big battlefield.

> You sigh. “What’s your name, anyhow? I’m Chuck.”
“Damon,” the guard says, extending a hand. “Damon the Leaper.”
You shake it. “Pleasure to meet you, Damon.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Damon grunts.

> You snack on a candy bar. “Tell me about Shamblers, Damon.”
“What about them?”
“You’ve been dealing with them for a long time. You know what they’re capable of. What do they look like?”

> You oh, not the walkers. Your town. Shamblers, you said.
“Mm. Not pretty. Heard one of them talk, though.”
“Yeah, pretty rare. So… what do they look like?

> You “You heard a zombie talk?”
“Yeah. Down in a mineshaft. They don’t, usually. They just get really… quiet. And, you know, eat your brains. But this one was different. It almost sounded human.

> You “Are you sure it wasn’t a person?”
“Pretty sure. It was on a dead… Hey!” Damon cries, sticking his hand in front of him.
You rap him upside the head.

> You “On a dead what?”
“A dead end. One of those mineshafts where it’s like… I don’t know, like an underground cavern.”
You frown.

> You “What were you doing down a mineshaft, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“Hm? Oh! You don’t want to know. Don’t think I do, anyway. Not exactly a nice story.”
“Tell me.”
“No.”
You frown, insistently.

> You shrug. “It’s okay. Doesn’t seem like there’s many nice stories anymore.”
“Alright, alright,” Damon sighs.

> You “No really, you don’t got to tell. God knows I got plenty I don’t want to think about, much less talk about.”
“Yeah… Alright. I was drunk. And horny. I was trying to get laid. You know how it is.”
You snort. “I should think so.

> You “In a mineshaft, though? Well, I guess it’s got ‘shaft’ in it…”
“I went down there to find a girl. You know, like most guys do. I don’t even know her name. Met this guy instead.”
“Heh. Got conned by a zombie, then.”

> You “Wait, you go into mineshafts to find girls? Not to be contrary, but I don’t think most guys do that.”

> You “You got some, uh, unique traditions in your town, I s’pose.”
“Yeah. Not many guys my age down there. And not many girls. Or, you know, anything else, really. It’s just… empty.”

> You “Right. Well. I’m going to see how far this bus will take me. I’ll let you off.”
Damon shakes his head.

> You “I’m uh, going out to the desert. I mean if you want to come with, maybe we could use an extra hand, but I can’t promise nothing.”
Damon considers it.
“Nah, I’ll just keep going, I guess.”
“Alright. Take care, kid.”
You board the bus, and take a seat.

> You drive bus to the Ranch.
The bus drives for hours, but eventually you pass the buildings of the old city, and drive out onto a barren landscape of rock and dirt, the sun high overhead.

> You sing ZZ Top songs tunelessly as you continue driving.
Hours pass. You realize you’ve hit the nightfall of the day when the lights of the bus are turned on to full. You continue driving for hours until the bus pulls into a rest stop, far from any buildings.

> You examine rest stop.
The bus pulls into the rest stop. It’s a long, single building, made of wood and tin. A long line of broken, dusty yellow buses are parked in a row, all their lights off.

> You “School’s out forever.”
You’re right. The old lady was correct. The school’s out for summer.
You get off the bus, and walk up to the snack machine.

You put in your token.

> You select jolly ranchers.
You get a jolly rancher.
You open it.
You lick the candy.
It’s good.
Suddenly, you hear a “Crack!”

> You dive for cover.
You duck behind the bus.
A bullet whizzes by your ear.
You peek out. No one in sight.
The sun is setting.
Suddenly, you realize you’re hungry.

> You crawl under bus and eat a candy bar.
It’s long gone. You’re getting too hungry to care, though.
You crawl out from behind the bus and stand.
You walk up to the snack machine.
You put in your token.

> You select chips.
You get a bag of Doritos.
You open it.
You are sorely lacking in the nutrition department.
You open your mouth.
You put the chips in.

> You use crowbar to break open snack machine.
You walk away.
Suddenly, the bus starts.
You jump and scream,
“Auugh!”
You sit down and are shaken.
You get up.

> You call out “Hey! That’s my ride!”
No one answers.
You sit back down and stand.
You wait.
Soon, the bus pulls away.
You wave.
It’s gone.
You walk over to the snack machine.

> You “Heck.” Search snack machine.
The machine’s been messed with. The money’s all gone. You reach into the slot, and grab the only object left in the machine.
It’s a crowbar.
You turn it over and over.

> You find food.
There’s a trail of discarded food leading over to the old warehouses. You follow it over to a large warehouse, where several people sit in lawn chairs, munching on chips and drinking soda.

> You “Uh, hey there. Mind if I share your fire, so to speak?”
The people are rude. They yell at you, and call you names. You sit down among them, and they resume calling you names.
Suddenly, you notice a girl in the corner.

> You examine girl.
You notice her white skin, and her dark hair. She looks so sweet, so innocent.
You notice her eyes. They’re as dark as the pupils of your eyes.

> You “Uh, can someone stop the insults long enough to tell me about that girl? She don’t look so good.”
One of the men stands up and walks over to you.
“Who are you?” he asks. “What do you want?”
“I’m trying to find my ride. The driver left me at the gate.”

> You “Well, I was the driver. Then there was a new driver, and he done drove off while I was getting some Doritos.”
The man looks at you.
“I think you’ve had enough Doritos.”
“Well, you can’t just judge a book by its cover, and all. I’m a good driver.

> You “Drove that bus all the way out from Odessa. You been to Odessa lately? Seen better days, I tell you what.”
“Uh huh. I need some water. My throat’s all scratchy.”
The man walks over to the small shed, and returns with a bottle.

> You “I’m just passing through on the way to my brother’s Ranch. Shouldn’t be too far now, though I still ain’t looking forwards to the hike.”
The man looks at you.
“What’s your name?” he asks.
“Ash.”
“I’m Bill.”
“You’re going to have to help me with my gas problem.

> You “Fresh out of antacids, Bill.” You chuckle.
“I found these in the bottom of my bag. They must be really, really, really, good antacids.
The man laughs.
“

> You “But seriously, what’s the problem Bill?”
“Gas.”
“I don’t have no gas.”
The man sighs.
“You got a spare can?”
“Yeah, but it’s just full of water.
“So what?”
“

> You “There was gas in that bus. Well, diesel. Anyhow, bus is gone. Say, you got any alcohol?”
“Just some vodka in the vending machine down the road. “
“
“Perfect.”
The two of you walk outside.
“You can drive my truck. I’ll drive your bus.”
“

> You get in truck.
“Oh, okay.”
Bill gets in the front seat of the truck, while you get in the back.
“I can’t believe you’re driving my truck. My bus. My gas.

> You wonder who’s talking. “Bill, what was with that pale girl back there?”
“Nothing. Don’t worry about it.”
“She was all creepy and quiet. And had really dark eyes and hair. Not that I’m saying you’re supposed to be flirting or something.

> You “But I mean, really really dark eyes. Like she maybe wasn’t totally human.”
“She wasn’t. But that’s not really something you need to concern yourself with. Let’s just go.”
You drive for a few minutes, before you come to a fork in the road.

> You “Oh I ain’t gonna do nothing, just curious. Never seen a zombie looking like her.”
“Yeah, that girl was one of the old school.”
“She a zombie?”
“No, just really, really old. They didn’t become what they are until years after the collapse.

> You “What are you talking about? She didn’t look old. You’re not telling me she’s a vampire or something are you?”
Bill laughs.
“No, she’s not a vampire. She’s just… Old.”

> You “So what is she exactly? Alien? Fairy? Chupacabra?”
“She’s a ghoul.”
“What’s a ghoul?”
“They’re the result of unnatural experiments by the US military.”
“US military?

> You “Dang. What kind of experiments?”
“They tried to create super-soldiers with ghoul/vampire biology.”
“What’s a vampire?

> You “Wait, so there ARE vampires?”
“No, you moron. I’m saying they’re werewolves.”
You look at him.
“They’re what, now?
“They’re werewolves.”
“What’s a werewolf?

> You look up at the moon nervously.
“What’s a werewolf?”
“It’s a creature that occurs in folklore and mythology.”
“So do you mean they’re REAL?”
“Of course not. I’m just fucking with you.”

> You “How much are you fucking with me? The whole thing? Ghouls and all?”
“No, I’m really fucking with you. Ghouls are real. You can stop worrying; you’re not going to be eaten by a ghoul.”
You take a deep breath, and you relax.

> You “She did seem to be pretty well behaved. Hey, wait. Ghouls eat corpses, right? Does she eat zombies?
“She eats the recently dead. I’d imagine most of the people she eats probably just go to the pot.”
“She just goes and takes food out of a pot?

> You “Man if she ate zombies I can see why you’d keep her around, funny looking eyes or no.”
“I have more important things to do than eat around the old lady. She’s not that bad.
“Well that’s good, you’re alright with her around, obviously.”
You nod.
“

> You “So about that vodka…”
You pull into the driveway of an apartment complex.
“That’s it,” says Bill. “Home sweet home.”
The two of you exit the car and walk to the door.

Quest Completed!
(make it to a safe community where you can live safe from zombies)

So we just finished Memorial Day Weekend here in the States, which is ostensibly an observance day for the sacrifice of soldiers past, but mostly these days is an opportunity for people to get out and enjoy the park, or the beach, or any number of other public occasions as Spring kicks into high gear. Of course this year was different…

Or not. Crowds from sea to shining sea, with facemask protocols and social distancing far from 100% observed.

I look at some of the images and am reminded of that page where we were showing the extremes of the Repops with the teenagers dangling their buddy over hungry zombies. Except in reality, it’s not just teenagers. These are grown adults who are risking themselves and their families over a pool party. This is a nation who was up in arms not too long ago because kids were supposedly chowing down on detergent pods, now chugging fish tank cleaner because the President said maybe that might be cool. Joke? About as funny as a (literal) heart attack.

I can’t keep up. I am not worthy. Reality has become more cartoonish than my wildest imaginings.

At least no one dies from my writing and Dawn’s art. This? I can’t unfortunately say the same. I understand the want/need to reopen businesses and most everyone agrees it should be done “responsibly” but in practice, the responsibility angle keeps getting discarded. If this really were the zombie apocalypse, well, now I know I have continuing observation of how everything went south.

Remember when you were a teenager and everything bad that happened seemed like the end of the world? And you just couldn’t make your parents understand how much your life was OVER because you let out an audible fart in the middle of English class right as the guy or girl you had a crush on was giving a presentation?

That’s not an example drawn from personal experience, by the way, but there were other occasions as embarrassing, and certainly there was a lack of perspective on my part that maybe the zit breaking out on my nose before the Winter Formal wasn’t on the scale of, say, the Black Death. Call it the minipocalypse, I suppose.

So yeah, it’s weird seeing people in the U.S. gathering in rallies, often with guns, for the purpose of… demanding a decent haircut. It’s honestly the sort of stuff I would have written as satire, but is really happening and is happening in all seriousness. It’s downright surreal.

We’re not exactly caged up despite some of the hyperbole spewing around. Hell, my friends in France aren’t allowed to be more than 3 miles away from their home right now or the police can fine them. No such restrictions are in place in America. Heck, if anything we’re shifted in the other direction and hell bent on returning to business as usual.

I can’t help but feeling we realized (belatedly) that the bridge was out, but all we did here was pump the brakes a bit and now we’re not only coasting blithely towards the plunge but hitting the gas. There’s a lot of minipocalypses to speak of as a result of the crisis, and not all as petty as a shaggy head of hair. Lost revenue, lost jobs… these aren’t non-serious matters in their own right, but on the other hand I grew up part of a family where your health and the health of those you loved were always the top of the list of considerations, so if you tell me my favorite sushi restaurant can welcome me back to dine-in at the cost of a mere 100 more people dead, well, I’m going to wait on that bowl of fresh miso soup.

I’ll go further than that perhaps. My program where I was going to eat drink and be merry as much as possible through the crisis (provisioned through cautious trips to the store plus delivery) ran smack into a diagnosis of adult onset diabetes. I’ve never been the healthiest person with the healthiest lifestyle, but I was holding steady on the glucose front last year and so I think this year’s housebound state broke me as I dropped to next-to-no exercise and drinking way too much soda and alcohol. I was just trying to cope, and now I’m denied that particular route of coping.

But still, if I step outside my own perspective, even something as serious as diabetes is a minipocalypse. I’m in no hurry to potentially contribute to a capital-A Apocalypse by venturing blithely forth before a COVID vaccine is available, especially now that I’m squarely in the “high-risk-of-death” group.

I figure I can survive a few more bad hair months in exchange for surviving, period.

You know, I feel like a break from commenting on current events, even if they are interesting from an apoc-fiction perspective. It’s a bit like researching a war by being close to the front, I feel… “Wow, here I am in the action as it happens!” <shell explodes in near distance> “Okay too close! Taking five!”

So let’s talk a term that I’ve somehow missed out on in my near half-century of existence: malaphor.

Metaphor? No, malaphor. Listen, don’t make me repeat myself or there’ll be Hell to shake a stick at!

The term malaphor itself is a portmanteau  of “malapropism” and “metaphor.” In a malapropism a similar but incorrect word is used in a phrase, for example “Behold the suppository of all wisdom!” or “You ain’t heard the least of me!”

Malaphor takes that phenomenon and extends it to an entire idiom. I mean look at what I typed above and you might have scratched your head and thought, “Isn’t the phrase ‘there’ll be Hell to pay!’?” and it’s something else you shake a stick at?

Congrats, pardner, you found yourself a malaphor.

“We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it” is another good example. It’s closely related to the concept of a mixed metaphor but isn’t so much outright contradictory as just a bizarre mixing of colloquialisms.

Stick that in your pipes that broke the camel’s back.