Successfully absorbing the zd.o vernacular is a critical step in your pre-zombie holocaust preparations. During your research, you may discover that a few vocal members of the Moravian linguistic intelligentsia have openly and quite vehemently opposed reviewing our necrabulary in their bi-annual journal Ten Vlhký Otvor. While we respect their right to ignore the inevitable, we implore you not to make the same mistake. You wouldn't pass up a chance to skull-fuck Tony Robbins with a bronzed "My Little Pony," would you? We didn't think so. Please pay attention.
bait-class in·di·vid·u·al: n. A living person with negligible anti-zombie skills and abilities. Frequently shortened to BCI.
Ex. "We left Frank behind. The explosion that removed his arms had transformed him from a zombie-killing machine into a bait-class individual."
[see also meatsnack]
Black
Je·sus Con·stant:
n.
This theorem was first postulated after the fourth start-to-finish viewing of Romero's original three documentaries. Much like the original Jesus1, the black protagonist in each movie is infallible and always guides his people to salvation (with the debatable exception of the first movie, but that's only because the crazy white guy sabotages Ben at every opportunity.) Ben, Peter, and John2 are all consummate leaders, wily strategists, and excellent survivors. Why would the black man prove to be such an excellent survivor in the necropocalyptic future? Some say it has to do with the unfortunate skill set that the black man has been forced to develop over the last half millennia or so.
-Knowing how to survive a murderous mob/horde?
Check.
-Being invisible to the vast majority (be it white people or zombies)?
Check.
-Being handy with firearms in order to protect himself and his family from cops and gangstas?
That's a 9 millimeter check.
-Accustomed to hostile reactions because of the color of his skin or its future analogy (i.e., because his lungs actually function and his flesh is delicious) and knowing how to handle them?
Check.
-Using his own wiles and abilities to survive in a world looking to devour his mind, body, and soul?
Checkmate.
What knowledge might the layman glean from this theorem? If you are lucky enough to have a black man in your survival group, then count your blessings. Follow him and everything is going to be OK.
Ex. "In the days preceding Charles' arrival, we had lost seven party members to bite wounds and unprotected sex. Once he took the helm, the Black Jesus Constant was in full effect as he led our team to freedom through the corpsechute formerly known as the Lincoln Tunnel. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that Charles is black."
1 For those of you who still cling to the ridiculous notion that Jesus was a white man, please pick up line one. Pat Robertson has yet another fucking bridge to sell you.
2 All sharing the name of an Apostle? A coincidence? We think not.
blood pupp·et·: n. Any recently bitten human that has yet to exhibit clear symptoms of shamblorhood. More specifically, someone who has incurred a small bite that is easily hidden and thus unnoticed by any of the victim's traveling partners. Most specifically, someone who purposefully keeps their wound(s) hidden in hopes of "walking it off." Since these wounds will of course lead to the victim becoming a surprisor, a non-disclosing blood puppet is considered the worst kind of traitor (excluding Robert Bingham).
Ex. "Franklin turned to Pedro and noticed the spreading red stain on his shirt sleeve. Pedro looked apologetic and tried to smile. Franklin wasted no time, forcibly bending over and fucking his counterpart before his blood puppet status fully converted him into a shamblor."
brain buf·fet·: n. Easy prey for a zombie. Refers to any person or persons who have put themselves in a zombie-convenient position due to incompetence, hot-dogging, or simply due to charnel law. One is especially prone to becoming a brain buffet if one fails in a spectacular attack/escape attempt (see Tony Jaa Gambit).
Ex. "The doors to the adult day care center were propped open. Two shamblors wandered in and quickly delighted in the waiting brain buffet."
brain sa·ving sta·tion: n. Any local business contacted by zombiedefense.org prior to or immediately following the onset of the Zombie Holocaust that agrees to distribute zombie defense pamphlets and to assist those in need during the troublesome hours and days that follow ZH0H.
Ex. "Pursued by fourteen gimping rot-wagons, Susan felt waves of relief wash over her as she rounded a corner to come face-to-face with a "brain saving station" banner."
brain·thirst: n. The insatiable urge for brains which physically drives zombies. Brainthirst also acts as a vague sort of "brain radar" that aids shamblors in locating living brain tissue above and beyond the limits of their (formerly) human senses.
Ex. "Anne Sullivan thought she was safe around the undead Helen Keller, but the latter's brainthirst ensured meatsnack status for the former."
breath·er: n. Common slang for a living, sentient and non-undead individual.
Ex. "I turned toward the noise and pulled the trigger. I didn't have time to see if I was dealing with a breather or a shamblor. When the flashlight's pale beam finally focused upon my target, I came to realize it had actually been Dave Coulier. He really should have cut it out."
bum·ble·bee: n. Any meatsnack or BCI that survives well into CSB despite being hamstrung by their own ineptitude.
Ex. "Tanya was six years old, afflicted with severe Down's Syndrome, and had lost her feet in a motorcycle accident shortly after birth. Imagine our surprise when we stumbled into the long-abandoned Dairy Queen and found her too obese to move having spent the previous eight months cramming her gullet with stale sugar cones. We gawked at this young bumblebee's incredible fortune for a short while before moving her outside to be used as bait in an elaborate pyrotechnic display/trap which shut down two zomblors."
char·nel law: n. The strange phenomenon in which fate aligns itself with the zombie horde in every possible circumstance. It's just like Murphy's Law, but substitute the words "zombie" and "certain death" for pretty much everything.
chub·rub: n. Developed by Justin Wilson and Rachel Ray, chub rub is a seasoning blend consisting of smoked paprika, dried sage, and potting soil. Carried by survivalists, chub rub is used to make cannibalism more palatable.
Ex. "I don't give a shit if you did roll her fat ass in chub rub. I'm not eating Ricki Lake."
ci·ne·ri·tious par·a·chute: n. The imaginary "agreement" you have with God entitling you to either an inexhaustible cache of high-powered weaponry or maajickal immunity to zomblification in the event of the necropalypse.
Ex. "I had confidence in my chances of survival. After all, I still had my cineritious parachute."
com·plete so·ci·e·tal break·down: n. The point in time following ZH0H when all known societal and governmental structures have failed thus signifying that a true post-necropalyptic life has begun. Frequently referred to as CSB. Also known as Ron Paul's wet dream.
Ex. "A wall of burned-out tanks and military vehicles surrounded St. Louis. When I saw that a chickadee had nested in the treads of one of the tanks, I became suddenly aware that complete societal breakdown had occurred. I paused and then ate the chickadee's eggs. Fuck 'em. Shit had just gotten real."
corpse pic·nic: n. Any post-zombie holocaust location that acted as a major population center in a pre-zombie holocaust world.
Ex. "Steve took his moped into the heart of downtown Atlanta and quickly found that the city of his youth had become a corpse picnic."
dis·co noc·tur·nal: v. Taking undeserved credit.
Ex. "I can’t believe Gus is disco nocturnaling us again. I mean, he cowered in the hotel lobby while we clubbed rot boxes for an hour and a half. AN HOUR AND A FUCKING HALF! Now he’s the hero? What the fuck, man? He doesn’t even play an instrument."
e·sca·por: n. A specific type of zombie. An escapor is a human being who flees combat, but later rejoins the fray as a zombie. See also ironic karma and John Kerry.
Ex. "Dan had seen enough. He leapt through the plate glass storefront window in an attempt to flee. He didn't get far and soon returned (minus his right arm and both ears) as an escapor."
few·chor n. It's kind of like the future, but it's riddled with the undead.
Ex. "When she was young, Susanna had planned to spend her future as a housewife. After the zombie holocaust, she knew her fewchor was destined to revolve around gangrene and the occasional can of dog food."
friend·ship's ter·mi·nal du·ty: n. 1. An almost always unspoken promise between true friends that if someone is bitten by a zombie, a real friend will kindly murder the doomed person in order to help him avoid the fate worse than death that is shamblorhood. Nothing could be more pure or true. Frequently referred in acronym form as FTD.
Ex. "James and I managed to get the fire-door closed and locked. I noticed a bite wound on his left hand. He trembled for a moment, then reloaded his pistol. He handed it to me and a tear rolled slowly down his sooty cheek. We'd been friends since the fourth grade and now I had to perform friendship's terminal duty."
2. A flower delivery service. Yes, that's right. They deliver fucking flowers. Not only does that completely drain the blood-prong, but one must ponder a very important question: Can there possibly be something more worthless in a world that faces certain destruction? I mean besides religion?
Ex. "Hello, FTD? I'd like two dozen roses, please. I'd like to make up for the fact that I hit her."
flip-six-three hole: n. 1. A term used to refer to an absolutely flawless plan of action with no chance of success which guarantees complete victory.
Ex. "An enormous throng of oncoming zombies blocked their only avenue of escape from the alleyway. Having finally decided to try to thread their way to freedom by brachiating across the dangling ladders of overhead fire escapes while co-wielding a ceramic toilet tank cover with their feet to crush the hordes' collective noggins, Javier looked at Alex and said, 'Flip-six-three-hole?'"
2. A brilliant lazorfootball play devised by Buenos Aires High School student athletes Johnny Rico and Dizzy Torres. This play was used to win the South American 6-A Championship game in the year 2138. Sadly, Buenos Aires wasn't able to enjoy its champion status for long because it was destroyed by a horrific bug attack shortly afterwards.
Ex. "The flip-six-three hole was a success. Dizzy scored 22 points, a hat trick, and had managed to capture the golden snatch."
floor
snap·per:
n.
(both singular and plural). A fully-animated severed zombie head
containing an intact zombie brain. A group of floor snapper is called a
shoal.Ex. 1. "The katana made short work of the horde, but left the board room filled with rolling floor snapper."
2. "A shoal of floor snapper stood between Nancy and the whirling blades. Decapitated bodies, in varying stages of decay, surrounded the helichopper."
fright·mare: n. Any sort of highly terrifying vision or mental image which is imagined or based on real events. Frequently experienced by one who has come in close contact with the walking dead. These visions commonly occur to those who have witnessed copious amounts of zombie inflicted carnage on a first-hand basis and happen with a higher degree of intensity immediately following such an encounter. Scarewolves may or may not be involved.
Ex. "Until the day he died, Peter suffered from frightmares of the day his brother told him of the improper relationship he'd been maintaining with their mother's corpse."
hot dog: n. 1. One who recklessly engages in a style of fighting with zombies that demonstrates a preference for the perceived "style" of the kill over the safety of the living combatant.
Ex. "With only a single zombie left, that fucking hot dog Jonathan felt a moral imperative to fancy up what should have been an easy kill by starting up the wood chipper."
2.
A moist, cylindrical sausage-like food typically made from ground beef
and pork, which is traditionally served in a piece of elongated bread.
Ex. "I fucking love hot dogs."
jon·a·than tay·lor thom·as n. Any handsome adolescent boy still alive following ZH0H.
Ex. "Admittedly, fourteen year old Stacey was lucky to be alive. She was even luckier to have a Jonathan Taylor Thomas in her survival squad, even if he did have a hook-hand."
mag·ic us·er n. Anyone addicted to methamphetamine.
Ex. "Jamie looked in the mirror which showed a man who hadn't slept in three days. He knew that he'd finally completed the transformation from recreational tweaker to full-blown magic user."
mar·blom·e·ter n. An instrument used to measure the relative importance of a given situation. Measurements displayed on this instrument reflect the percentage of figurative "marbles" to be gained or lost depending on the outcome of the situation in question.
Ex. "The marblometer readings were unusually high when Douglas decided to rappel from the 10th floor window of his zombie infested apartment using the entrails of his recently deceased landlord and a hastily sharpened railroad spike."
meat·snack: n. A particularly clumsy, unlucky, unskilled, "gun shy," handicapped, morbidly obese, and/or idiotic person who is likely to be devoured immediately following the onset of the zombie holocaust. - adv. meat·snack·ly
Ex. "I would save your life, but by letting you die now I am insuring that there will be one less zomblor shambling the streets; you fucking meatsnack."
[see also bait-class individual]
mo·nog·a·my: n. A situation where two people promise to exclusively make sweet love and fuck each other over; whether in sickness or health (but not brain-death - that's a get-out-of-jail-free card), for richer or poorer (not so much the latter), until death (or necropalypse) do them part.
Ex. "I believe in monogamy... unless a bunch of zombies show up. Then I'm fucking everything and everyone."
ne·crop·a·lypse: n. Common vernacular for the total sum of the changes that will be experienced across all aspects of life at the point when the animated dead have risen in sufficient number to thoroughly disrupt the normal order of the world.
Ex. "Gregory - it's not the rapture. It's the necropalypse. Now quit praying and get on your knees."
pan·crack: 1. n. The sound emitted by the breaking open of a zombie's skull-case.
Ex. "I clubbed the zombie as hard as I could and the resounding pancrack shook the windows."
2. v. pancracked, pancracking, pancracks -tr. The act of breaking open a zombie's skull-case with a bludgeon.
Ex. "I took the baseball bat in both hands and pancracked the shit out of him."
re·tard: n. Let's face it, champ - probably you.
Ex. "I'm a goddamned retard."
sack down: v. sacked down, sacking down, sacks down -intr. To show extreme cowardice in response to even the least of threats. This display is never associated with high marblometer readings.
Ex. "The hobo approached Belinda. Instead of directly addressing him, she sacked down and crossed the street. Now she takes a different route to work altogether."
sack up: v. sacked up, sacking up, sacks up -intr. To ostentatiously exhibit courage in a given situation as a result of overwhelming peer pressure or some steely reservoir of fortitude. This display is often associated with high marblometer readings.
Ex. "Jose (not Linda) pointed at the zombie horde outside his living room window, looked his crying 12-year old son in the eyes, and said, 'It's time to sack up, beotch.'"
silk stock·ings: n. A well-known anti-undead offensive technique involving three or more sentient humans and any kind of attention diverting noise making device. Originated in 2003 by the late research savant Welton R. Stock.
Ex. "Welton Stock prefers that his mistresses are well-versed in silk stockings."
snack in·dex: n. A measure of the relative desirability of a given target to a shamblor.
Ex. "The two men were pinned beneath the overturned dune buggy with shamblors rapidly closing. Eddie Deezen wasn't too worried however because he knew they'd first go for Luciano Pavarotti considering his higher snack index."
snack ra·di·us: n. The area within arms length of a zombie.
Ex. "Steve made a critical error as he stepped forward to strike the first zombie. By doing so, he entered the second zombie's snack radius and quickly became a meatsnack."
tard·hand: v. The action of failing to execute what should be a routine kill.
Ex. "A single shamblor approached Gilgamesh. His revolver was fully loaded. Once the shamblor was within three meters, Gilgamesh began to fire. Despite years of careful training, he somehow managed to tardhand away five rounds before finally achieving TSF."
To·ny Jaa Gam·bit: n. The Tony Jaa Gambit is a subcategory of the flip-six-three hole. The Tony Jaa Gambit means to leap onto the shoulder of the nearest shamblor when surrounded and run from shoulder to shoulder until one has safely exited the circle of undeath.
Ex. "'We're surrounded! How ever shall we escape?' 'Only one option darlin'; we're gonna execute the Tony Jaa Gambit.'"
- v. Tony Jaaed, Tony Jaaing, Tony Jaas -tr. To pancrack a zombie in hand-to-hand combat. zombiedefense.org does not recommend this strategy. When used as a verb, the term "Tony Jaa" may be replaced with its synonym, "Ong Bak."
Ex. "'It bit my uncle. I'm gonna Tony Jaa that m-effer.'"
to·tal skull fail·ure: n. Frequently referred to by its acronym (TSF), total skull failure occurs when the brain-case has been sufficiently damaged to prevent the brain from functioning.
Ex. "As the full weight of the safe came to rest upon the shamblor's head, total skull failure was almost certainly assured"
two-state so·lu·tion n. 1. A rare, hot doggishly unfortunate rookie maneuver in which a zombie is decapitated in spectacular fashion before its brain is destroyed; resulting in the creation of a floor snapper and the accidental and equally spectacular death of said rookie.
Ex. "Jesus H. Christ, Lorainne. That was a goddamn two-state solution if I've ever seen one. Tell me you got video of that shit. TELL ME!"
2. Any seemingly reasonable yet perfectly unacceptable compromise.
Ex. "It's always a flippin' two-state solution with Mom. I said to her, 'Mom, I'll have sex with you on Thursdays and sex with Grandma on Fridays.' Do you think that satisfied either one of them? Of course not. I'm telling you, dude... it is time I cut the cord."
Var·mint ma·neu·ver: n. A series of increasingly offensive comments, eventually ending in blatant racism. Typically associated with rural southeastern North Carolina.
Ex. "Then he started in with the varmint maneuver. I told him to fuck himself."
zom·bear: n. 1. Mythical creature rumored to be the harbinger of the impending zombie holocaust.
Ex. "Lithographic artifacts from 19th century Arizona support the belief that the zombear played a central role in the Hopi mythos."
2. Common surname within the Franco-Rwandan migrant cobbler community.
Ex. "The cuttlefish slipper, invented by Gustav Zombear in the late 1920s, remains very popular across sub-Saharan Africa."
zom·bie:
n.
A corpse (featuring an intact central nervous system) that rises and
attempts to devour living human tissue. Common variants include, but
are not limited to, shamblor, stumblor, rot box, zomblor, stink wagon,
perishable, etc.
Ex. "Before her death, Ruth Bader-Ginsburg had been a Supreme Court Justice. Now, as she gnawed on the cracked skull-cases of both John Paul Stevens and John Paul Jones, she had been reduced to a simple zombie."
zom·bie hol·o·caust ze·ro hour: n. The exact moment when the zombie apocalypse occurs, independent of cause. Commonly shortened to ZH0H.
Ex. "There was a flash of light, and the corpse sat up on the slab. I looked at my watch, which had stopped. Evidently, 12:02 GMT was zombie holocaust zero hour."
zom·bu·la·tion: n. 1. The whole number of zombies in a country or any other definitional region. 2. The total of zombies occupying an area or making up a whole.
Ex. "The insatiable appetite of zombie Dom DeLuise quickly increased the size of the zombulation in France to well in excess of 747,000."
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