The Coming Zombie Apocalypse and My Birthday Weekend

Birthday weekend had a great start on Friday when my parents offered to take the girls out for supper while I had some much needed quiet time at home alone.  Mike had gone to Castor overnight to do some stuff at our house there and I had a couple of hours to kill.  So while eating some Lipton Sidekick's noodles straight out of the pot (yes, I sometimes love me some processed food!)  I sat and watched Resident Evil: Afterlife.  In hindsight I realized that maybe that hadn't been such a good idea when I would be sleeping alone that night and jumping out of my skin at every little noise.  It's also not great when you live near a hospital, 'cause where do you think the zombies are going to come from when the outbreak starts?!

I never used to like zombie movies, and I still don't, really.  But for some reason Mike got me hooked on them and so I have ended up watching most of them and getting sucked into zombie culture.  One of the best books I have read in the last few years is World War Z by Max Brooks (Mel Brook's son) who also wrote The Zombie Survival Guide.  I loved it so much that I made Mike download it and listen to it as he commuted back and forth from Medicine Hat to Castor.  It's written as an oral history of a world war/ apocalypse and is really a social commentary more than anything else. It's global in scope and a fascinating read.  I highly recommend it, even if you don't like the horror genre, it's more like reading a future history book.  I heard an interview that Jian Ghomeshi did with George A. Romero regarding his cult classic zombie movies.  Romero's intention with his work was always social commentary:  for example, Dawn of the Dead was about American consumerism and Diary of the Dead was about journalism and social media/networking.  Anyways, enough about zombies.

The weekend was all downhill from there.  My throat started to hurt that night and by morning I felt miserable.  Then Mike called to say that it was snowing and blowing badly in Castor and should he stay another night?  I told him he might as well, as I felt too miserable to go out anyways.  I took some aspirin and wrapped my sore and swollen throat up tightly in a scarf (Try it next time you have a sore throat, the warmth of the scarf really makes a difference.)  in the afternoon and took the kids to the library theatre to see the latest Shrek movie.  Don't worry, I didn't breath on anyone.  Other than that I spent the weekend in bed reading and dozing as the house deteriorated around me.  Mike came home late Sunday morning with a vehicle full of stuff from Castor that had to be put somewhere.  So I dragged myself around a bit putting some stuff away and then went back to bed.

The lowlight of the weekend was on Sunday afternoon when our 3 year old choked on a tiny plastic toy.  I flipped her over and banged her back until she coughed it up and then promptly swallowed it.  It was horrible.  I'm terrified of my kids choking.  It's one of the reasons I don't like going camping up north in the boonies.  We live close to the hospital and it still doesn't seem close enough in those few seconds when your child can't breath.  Now I'm scared to even leave her alone while I go and shower.  I feel like I can't let her out of my sight.

So it ended up being a not great birthday weekend.  No meals out, or cake, or roller-derby and I didn't even see my husband on my birthday.  I even missed watching the Oscars, which I ALWAYS watch.  I'm going to have to make up for it once I feel totally better.  I think I will turn April into a joint birthday month for me and my oldest daughter!