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1) More intimidating than a rottweiler, yet quieter.
A lot of people keep guard dogs on the understanding that these razor blades with legs will intimidate a burglar enough that he won’t even think of smashing your window and making off with your porn-filled iPad. Barring that (or if you happen to have an extremely stupid burglar scoping out your house) a guard dog will still stop the burglar, but also splash blood liberally all over your carpet and walls. But your iPad will be safe. The down side to this sort of protection plan is that dogs bark. That’s part of the intimidation act, letting the bad guys know that there’s a dog waiting to gnaw on their femur in this house. But it also means that you have to listen to a lot of random woofing every time the neighborhood children run across the street, or the neighbor’s handbag dog takes a crap in your rose bushes.

On the other hand, a zombie serves many of the same functions as a guard dog – intimidation of intruders by standing menacingly in backlit windows or doorways, chilling vacant stare that puts fear in the heart of evildoers, leaving a twenty foot long smear of blood on your linoleum – but without the hell hound-style baying. Instead, there’s the much quieter (but still intimidating in its own way) moan of “braaaaaaaains.” As distinctive as the howl of the Hound of the Baskervilles, and twice as pants wetting, since it’s a zombie and not just a nice dog that’s been coated with glow in the dark paint.

2) Other than the blood, easy to clean up after.
Think about it. Have you ever, once, in all the zombie movies you’ve ever watched, seen one of the walking dead stop for a potty break? Their relentless pursuit of living flesh, unbroken by the occasional pitstop, is one of their most terrifying features. So yes, you may have to spend a lot of time spraying your carpets down with Nature’s Miracle to get out all the blood, but say goodbye to having to scoop poop out of a box of clay bits, or hunting for it in the overgrown jungle of your backyard. Personally, if I had the choice between slipping on a dog turd as I run through the grass or slipping on a bit of some trespasser’s intestine, I’d vote for the intestine every time.

3) No vet bills.
Zombies are like Hondas. You get one, and then you just run it until it falls apart. It doesn’t really matter what one eats – no more running your pet to the vet because the little darling thought that eating four inches of plastic tubing sounded like an excellent idea. No more vaccinations – once you’re a zombie, rabies is about the last thing in the world you’d be concerned about. A zombie will take a licking and keep on ticking, at least until someone destroys whats left of its brain with a well placed shovel blow or a couple episodes of Jersey Shore. And if that happens, it’s easy enough to find a new zombie once you’ve said a few words over the ashes of your former pet.

Bonus: Like other pets, you can name all of your zombies the same thing. They won’t care. They’re zombies.

4) You don’t have to walk a zombie.
Seriously, leading one of the undead around on a collar? If that sounds like a fun time to you, you’ve got some issues, man.

5) Save on pet food.
Your pet food budget basically drops to zero once you’ve acquired a zombie. Instead of paying good money for the meat that was too weird to be made into sausage, all you have to do is let your zombie wander the neighborhood. The neighborhood cat that keeps peeing in the bushes right in front of your house will make a lovely snack. Those awful children who think its hilarious to bounce a basketball against the side of your house at three in the morning when you’ve got a hangover? Gone. The weird guy that stole that pair of underwear you threw away because it was just some holes held together with elastic out of your trash can? I wouldn’t bet on those odds in Vegas.

Now, I’m sure there are some bleeding hearts out there that will say a healthy, happy zombie is an indoor zombie, and not one shuffling through the streets of your neighborhood and decimating the squirrel population. These people should go back to their hippy retreats where they can fondle their dread locks and convince themselves that tofu isn’t actually made out of styrofoam. It’s a freaking zombie. If it gets hit by a car, the zombie will likely come out just a little more ragged than it started and get a free snack on top of the deal. Want cleaner, quieter neighborhoods where nothing even survives to become roadkill? Outdoor zombie, all the way.

Now you no longer have to try to imagine the fluffy dress.

Electron Boy saves Seattle. Make a Wish does some incredible things for kids, but this has got to be one of the coolest. I think every fledgling geek has probably fantasized at some point about being a super hero, but to actually get to play that out in a story that involves lots of other people? Wow.

And of course, no WoW nerd can read this story without thinking of Ezra Chatterton, who left his mark on a fantasy world. There’s a quest in the tauren starting area that he designed, among other things. And he’s remembered as an elder now during one of the game holidays.

More than just wish fulfillment, I think stories like these really do touch the lives of others. Everyone finds their own meaning in them, but it really strikes me how these kids are able to have a moment, or an afternoon, or a week of happiness, and simultaneously (perhaps accidentally) shout to the world, “I was here.”

Blub.

I received my official admissions letter from CU sometime in the middle of last week, and finally got around to ticking the little box that says “yes, yes ZOMG I’M GONNA BE A GRAD STUDENT” (I’m paraphrasing here) and wrote them a check for $200, then mailed it off. So it’s all official-like now – I’m going to get to wear the big girl geologist pants in a couple of years. Hopefully.

Colorado Skepticamp’s wiki page is now up, so you should go over there and sign up as an attendee. If you can do so without knowing the date, that is. The crack location hunting squad is still out in the jungles of the Denver-metro area, searching for a place for us to call home for several hours some Saturday or Sunday in the near future.

I am also of the opinion that the Colorado Skepticamp motto should be something like, “The highest Skepticamp around!” Particularly if we end up doing the event in Boulder.

The three whole people who read this blog (who aren’t my mom) may have noticed that my entries were so sparse as to be non-existent for the last three weeks or so. This is because I was very, very sick, with a horrible fevery illness that then proceeded to give me hives all over my body for the next week after the fever finally went away. Said illness was apparently an EBV infection, more commonly known as mono, according to my doctor. Let me tell you, calling it something as cutesy as “the kissing disease” doesn’t prepare you for how godawful you end up feeling, unless the implication is that you’ve been kissing a zombie cyborg terminator who’s come to the past to scramble your brain and various lymph nodes with an eggbeater made of razor wire.

I’m finally feeling mostly normal now, at least.

I am currently trying to work my way through this year’s Hugo nominees. So far, I’ve read The Windup Girl, which I enjoyed and would definitely recommend. It’s a very different take on a near future where global climate change has taken its toll, and I spent a lot of time being surprised by the unexpected turns the plot takes. I also attempted to read The City & The City and… didn’t enjoy it so much. I had a hard time getting in to it, and ended up returning it to the library when I’d read only about a third of it, since I couldn’t renew it. Now, keep in mind that I was also trying to read the book while in the vise-like grip of the epstein-barr virus, so it could be that I try the book again later and have a better time trying to read it. I’m currently working on Boneshaker, which has been interesting so far.

These new quarters for 2010 are just beautiful. And feature some of the most stunning geological features in our national parks. So really, what more could you ask for out of a coin?

And yes, I really did have a coin collection, once upon a time. Three giant binders worth, including a set of Mercury dimes that my dad passed on to me. Then when we moved during one summer while I was in high school, the box containing my coin collection mysteriously vanished along the way, and there were way too many boxes for me or my parents to notice it was missing until it was too late. To this day, I’m still pretty sure it got stolen by one of the movers, and I’m still not quite over it.

I wonder where people who collect coins sit in the geeky hierarchy relative to stamp collectors?

James Randi came out of the closet today. (Well, technically yesterday, since it’s now after midnight.)

I’ve had the honor of meeting Randi twice, and I respect him deeply, for a multitude of reasons. The first time I met him was in Boulder, for the Conference on World Affairs, and I only got that lucky because I was shamelessly fangirling all over Phil Plait at the time. I’ve looked forward to hearing him speak at TAM and listening to him whenever he’s on a podcast; he’s an utterly charming human being who never runs out of fascinating stories to tell. He’s been an inspiration to me personally, and I think there’s something indescribably wonderful about seeing a man who’s old enough to be my grandfather – and shockingly teeny and just a little frail besides – out there kicking ass and taking names, cutting horrible human beings to shreds with his rapier wit. So now we can add one more thing he’s done to the litany of what makes him deserving of his chosen moniker: Amazing.

And damnit, Randi, you’ve made me go all sniffly now.

Side note: I love what one commenter, FloGiston, says on that post: “Now you’re not only amazing, but fabulous as well!”