Allergy season is officially here. Yesterday the pollen counts were in the “high” zone for pollen in general and also for tree pollens. Curse you mother nature for twitterpating all the plants so powerfullly.

I feel like the original zombie girl right now. Yesterday I had my music on shuffle and it played Stagger Slide, Bring Me to Life, and Zombie all in a row. Nothing like your mp3 player sending you a message.

Today, I’ve started taking Claritin, and I have to say I’m still a zombie girl. I’m just not a slime covered zombie girl. Oh, well. I suppose we can’t have it all.

From xkcd.com.

So, I got under four hours of sleep last night because my fibromyalgia’s acting up and my back spasmed uncontrollably until 2:00AM. If the zombie apocalypse happens today, you’re all on your own. You’ll find me shambling unmolested among the hordes of flesh eating dead, because they know their own.

I live.

My cold is down to the manageable level after several days under the influence of DayQuil (which barely does anything and still makes me drowsy) to go to work, and NyQuil at all other times to get some relief from both my symptoms and consciousness, too, as it happens.

My friend, Heather, got me the most amazing and amusing book for Christmas, Zombiemania: 80 Movies To Die For. It’s a total scream, in the hysterically amused sense. It even has an afterward by Mark Donovan, of Hulking Zombie fame in Shaun of the Dead.

Brilliant! All hail our hulking zombie lord!

Genre fans should put this book on their “must read” lists, right after The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead. I’ve been enjoying reading the reviews, which include such things as “six degrees of necrophagia” and “It’s that guy from the one with the thing.” It’s been really fun to read and then re-watch the various zombie movies from my collection under the influence of NyQuil, which is to say I’ve been putting the movies in and falling asleep on the couch while they run.

I’m going to shamble upstairs to get some coffee. Who knows? After an exciting day of catching up on the laundry (which is currently in a sad state, thanks to being too ill to do anything but take NyQuil), there might be more zombie films and knitting, too!

Obviously too late for the holidays, since creator Foldedpigs has stated on her Etsy store for some time that she can’t take any more holiday orders, her Zombies Love Brains Mug is on my must have list for its classic styling and subtle sense of the ironic.

So, It was Halloween 2005. I was attending classes at the University of Iowa and working on campus. To celebrate, I wore my black hooded sweatshirt with the Umbrella Corporation patches ironed onto it. A subtle statement, I admit, but as a thirty-something in a college setting, I thought subtle was the best way to go.

My boss at the time, a twenty-something who should have gotten the reference, came up to me with a confused look on his face. “Umbrella Corporation?” He sounded even more puzzled than he looked. “What does Umbrella Corporation make?”

For a moment, I looked at him like he’d grown a second head. I couldn’t believe he didn’t get it. Normally, I would have taken the time to explain but, I have no sympathy on Halloween.

“Zombies,” I replied and walked away.