My wife is to blame for the Zombie Apocalypse

I never thought I’d be Patient Zero when it comes to spreading the Zombie Apocalypse virus that finally wipes out mankind. And I wasn’t. Turns out I was Patient One. The Lovely Mrs. Taylor had the distinction of being first. I contracted it from her.

It began three days ago, when Mrs. Taylor arrived home early from work. Abdominal cramps, generalized pain, nausea, a bit of a fever. I figured it was flu. After watching every episode of “House” at least twice, I’m now able to diagnose pretty much any malady in under 60 minutes, though rarely with any accuracy.

I gave her the Mother’s Prescription: warm Vernor’s, a soda cracker, and a cool washcloth applied to the forehead. She lay down to take a nap.

When she woke an hour later with the pain greatly increased, my diagnosis changed to possible appendicitis. For the record, Mrs. T is one of those annoying people who wouldn’t ask for a bucket of water if her feet were on fire. She’s just not a whiner. When she starts complaining of pain, I know it’s the real thing.

I bundled her into the car and we rushed to the emergency room. There, medical personnel with actual medical degrees took over. While I sat unnoticed at her bedside, nurses wired Mrs. T to every monitoring device imaginable, asked questions, filled out forms, poked, prodded, scanned.

A fairly cursory exam early on showed my previous diagnoses (flu and/or appendicitis) to be incorrect. So much for “House.” Unfortunately, while the docs could figure out what it wasn’t, they couldn’t seem to figure out what it was.

One of the scans they wheeled her off for required a “contrast dye” (whatever that is). Turns out Mrs. T is violently allergic to contrast dye. She swelled up like the Michelin Man as five nurses and a doctor worked frantically to keep her breathing passages open and to counteract the allergic reaction.

After being stabbed (I use the term “stab” intentionally) with the same sort of hypo used by John Travolta to save Uma Thurman’s life in “Pulp Fiction,” Mrs. T finally began shrinking to her original size. I can joke about it now, but it was probably the third scariest ten minutes of my life.

It was around this time I noticed the room was spinning. Considering the size of the bill we were no doubt incurring, I thought it reasonable to expect an exam room that remained stationary and I said so as I slipped from my chair.

Now, nurses are accustomed to wimpy husbands who just can’t shrug off a near-death experience; one of them caught me on my way down. When I could again focus, I found that now I was laid out on an exam table, wires attached by sticky tabs to every exposed inch of skin.

I was in my own room, which also was spinning. After separating my stomach from its contents, I felt a little better, but not much. The doctor, who obviously had also seen several episodes of “House,” decided Mrs. T and I had either food poisoning or were sharing some sort of virus. The fact the virus had jumped from her to me in the half-hour it took to drive to the emergency room worried me a bit.

I mean, in addition to “House,” I’ve watched a lot of zombie movies and this is how it always starts. I figured that within an hour or two, we’d both be rampaging through the hallways, snacking on LPNs as we went along.

The National Guard would be called in, but by then it would be too late. The zombie horde – made up mostly of nurses we’d only partially eaten – would be too large for the military to contain. The president would call in a nuclear strike, but again, too little, too late.

By Christmas, I figured, we’d all be shambling around like B-movie extras in an old George Romero flick; torn clothes, a few missing fingers, blank stares in whatever was left of our eyes.

But as luck would have it, it turned out to be some sort of stomach virus after all. Mrs. T and I both lived (though there was a stretch there when we weren’t too keen about that idea) and neither of us have developed a taste for human brains; probably a good thing since in the current political climate they seem to be in short supply.

Mrs. T is back at the office today, though she probably shouldn’t be. I’m writing this, but I’m in my pajamas at noon, so I’m not sure it counts as “work.” And the Zombie Apocalypse is again averted.

For now…

MTaylor325@gmail.com

(616) 745-9530

When it comes to Barbies or zombies, we must remain armed and vigilant

I recently covered a story about an ammo shortage that has affected not just this area, but the entire nation. Apparently, folks are stocking up big time on shells, mostly in .22 and 9mm calibers.

Why? Reasons vary. Most of those reasons are predicated on Internet rumors, like:

• Homeland Security has purchased 62 billion rounds in preparation for an upcoming class war in which guns will be taken away from ordinary citizens.

• The government is hiding the fact an asteroid is headed toward the Earth and after (pick a date and time) our planet is going to be a zombie-laden wasteland in which only the strong (and those with lots of ammo) will survive.

• Obama is evil and where is that birth certificate, anyway?!

• The government (insert conspiracy theory here).

In most of these rumors, the government fills the roll of Darth Vader, the nefarious, dark force against which we common men must remain ever vigilant and — more importantly — heavily armed.

Now, before you go blathering on about that whole “liberal media” thing, let me just say, I own guns; yes, handguns. Granted, they are of the cheap “Saturday Night Special” variety, but they do shoot bullets and are for most part accurate to within four or five feet.

My guns are far better suited to zombie apocalypse purposes than, say, hunting squirrels. I bought them years ago to go plinking with my son and stepson.

We used to take my daughter’s discarded Barbie dolls out to the shooting range and blast away until the ammo was gone. Dumb fun, man fun, but fun none the less.

Since the boys grew up and moved out, I haven’t had the guns out of the lock box. But I know where they are, should I ever have to face down a horde of deranged, killer Barbie dolls. God knows those Barbies have reason enough to lust for revenge, and quite possibly, long memories.

Problem is, because of those stupid Internet rumors, I can no longer get ammo. So I’m helpless to protect myself from rampaging 12-inch action figures.

And personally, I think problems with zombies or killer Barbie dolls are every bit as likely as is the government suddenly showing an inordinate interest in my inaccurate firearms. Frankly, I just don’t think the government — as an entity — is nearly smart enough to pull off something like the disarming of gun-totin’ America.

Sure, there are some very bright folks working jobs in the public sector. But somehow, when you put them all together in Washington, they are quickly absorbed by the lumbering, clueless, bureaucratic blob that is our federal government and become every bit as ineffectual and incapable of any real action as is the rest of the administration.

In short, there aren’t enough wingtip-wearing nerds in Washington to cause me to lose any sleep about what they might do. For the most part, I believe they’ll probably continue to do what they’ve done for decades: nothing.

They will make a lot of noise, blame each other for their inaction, and then vote themselves a juicy pay raise. The world will go on pretty much as it has for a generation, the ammo shortage will abate, and I will be able to re-arm myself for the coming Barbie/Zombie apocalypse. 

Mike’s book, “Looking at the Pint Half Full,” is available in eBook format at Amazon.com and in paperback at Robbins Book List in Greenville. Contact Mike at mtaylor325@gmail.com.