I used to do this thing where I’d hold up my credit card, y’know, when someone was at the door—I’d hold it up to the peephole instead of looking through, so if they tried to shoot me in the face, they’d shoot my Visa instead.

It never occurred to me that I’d still die, only slower, ’cause how would I eat without plastic? They still had to swipe it back then. You couldn’t just enter the number online, and your food magically appeared.

This one time, I couldn’t find my Visa, and the guy wouldn’t give me my food. But I had this string of pearls, those yellow South Sea ones—paid my rent for six months when I sold them. And this guy says, “gimme those, and I’ll give you your food.” So I ransomed my necklace for twelve bucks’ worth of Greek food, and I had to wait a week to get it back, because that’s how long it took to find my Visa.

That’ll be the worst part, if there’s ever a zombie apocalypse. Getting food, I mean. My z-pocalypse plan involves a greenhouse and a box of quail, but it takes time to get dinner from that. You can’t plant lettuce and cucumbers and have a salad that night. Even a bird takes some doing. You have to soak it and pluck it and scoop out its guts—oh, but kill it first!—and then you need a recipe, or you have to wait for eggs…. You can’t be lazy in zombieland.

Another thing, if the zombies come, I don’t know how to drive. I have this idea I’ll build my greenhouse in the tundra, let the zedders freeze solid outside, only how would I get that far north? I suppose I could dart from house to house till the city runs out, but after that, I’d need wheels. And someone to build me my greenhouse, because I drop things and break them, and I fail at IKEA.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not stupid. I know how to build a greenhouse, and a water filter, and a fence. It’s just, actually doing it…all those bits, and you’d need a ladder, and one of those things for digging post holes, ah…whatever you use to pour concrete, tin snips, glass cutters, a hammer…so many things, and I don’t have any of them.

It’d take me a while to set up my post-zombie paradise. Even so, I’d be fine. A zombie apocalypse, y’know, you’d just have to wait out the zeds. It wouldn’t take long for them to get too decomposed to move. Then, your main worries would be pathogens and the living, and I excel at avoiding both. People-shy and pathogen-paranoid, that’s me.

Anyone want to collect me, should we have an apocalypse (zombie or otherwise)? I can’t actually do anything, but I know how to stay alive.