Solanum.

"I was only thirteen on Z day. It feels like ages ago, but it's really only been four years. I was reading in my room, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix had just come out, I remember. The window was open because it was a hot July day and it was about 7:30pm. The sun was setting and casting a brilliant yellow glow across suburban Detroit. I heard the sounds of the weekend: children playing in the street, lawn mowers humming, air conditioning units buzzing on and off periodically. Their unified din put me in sort of trance as I turned each page of my book eagerly. I was forced to look away from my book when I noticed the neighbor across the street had left his lawnmower running and abandoned it, his name was Mr. Moore. Thinking it was nothing, I returned the the book. About ten minutes later I was distracted again when I heard the kids screaming and running back inside. Mr. Moore was chasing the kids, arms outstretched as if he was going to scoop the kids up in his arms. He couldn't catch up to the kids, he was just stumbling across the street. Alarmed, I ran downstairs to see more clearly. I opened the front door and there they were. About eight of them, all staring at me with they lifeless eyes, bite marks in various places. Most were on the neck or arms. I'd seen them so many times in movies and on tv that I didn't really register it to be real, that these four things in front of me were the undead. I think maybe it's best I don't talk about the rest right now. I get terrible dream when I talk about it for too long..

About three weeks after Z day, the government released a statement that what the country was experiencing in all 50 states was a mass breakout of Solanum. An infection that kills first, then takes over the brain in the form of an infection, completely controlling the now dead body. The press were calling them Zombies. It was almost comical at first, until you started seeing signs of outbreak everywhere. Not just North America anymore. The reason the infection hadn't spread all over the world in a couple days was that the government seemed to have a quarantine method planned out. And it was definitely planned out. All exits in and out of the continental U.S. were cutoff withing 12 hours of the first reportings of infection. You can't tell me that wasn't already thought up.

Whatever you call them, these were people who got infected (90% of the time through biting of the flesh) and died only to reanimate as a walking corpse, eager for the taste of the living.

These past four years it's certainly been a challenging. Living. That's all that drives me, the infection is thick on the urban ares but out here in the country, we only have about five or six attacks every two weeks or so. I stayed at camp Regis for about four months with my little brother. We were there the day it all went to hell, it all started when a hole was breached in the fence, something about a refugee family trying to leave. They were immediately mauled the second they got past the temporary haven of the fence gave us. Soldiers couldn't hold back the amount of infected that amassed around the breach. In the subsequent panic, I lost hold of my brother's grip. He was lost in the crowd.. I've been alone ever since."


-Journal entry: Z day +4 years, 8 months, 3 days.
(Sci Fi Entry 3.5?)

Sci Fi Log #2: Nuclear Proliferation

Flash! "Duck and cover, kids."

"I was sitting on top of Beverly hill the other day as the sun was just starting to set and I looked south out towards the high rises in the distance. As I watched the tiny silhouettes of airplanes and helicopters dart across the orange sky, I was blinded by a brilliant flash of light. It was brighter than anything I had ever seen before. I watched the beautiful mushroom cloud reach high into the atmosphere, I didn't try to run or anything. Everyone knows when a nuclear bombs hits, there's not a whole lot you can do. I could see the shock wave moving closer and closer through city streets until it finally reached me and I was no more."

Only the first sentence of what I just said was true, of course. I was sitting on the hill and had a daydream that was just one big 'What if?'

It's surprising to me how much of life itself comes down to 'What if?' What if the planet decides to implode? What if Russia or Iran gets antsy and sends a couple plutonium care packages over? What if an epidemic wipes out humanity? or even such trivial (relatively) things as What if I don't get into college? What if I have to move again? We live our daily lives with a given variable being that these bad things won't happen. But what if they did? Would we just take a step back and look at our situation then say "Hmm.. well that sucks."?

New paragraph.. too many question marks, not enough answers. Tying in the Chaos Theory, we can't predict what will happen in the far future. Especially for things like the goings on of our lives. Let's just say many years in the future you could see the way you die. A computer takes in every variable in your life imaginable and predicts how and when you die, would you want to see it?

I think I've written enough paragraphs that are comprised mostly of stupid questions. I'll be back when I know how to write.. Jurassic Park entry to follow soon.

Sci Fi Log #1: Shirtless Frankenstein

I give it a -5

Not having seen it before, I must say that Kenneth Branagh's rendition of Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" is one of the worst pieces of video production I have ever had to sit through. Not only did Kenny Branagh collect the amniotic fluid of a hundred women to fuel his experiment but he ended up wrestling to hold his lame creation up, covered in the stuff. Pardon me but.. Robert Deniro as Viktor Frankenstein's creation? You must be barking. I'll finish that thought with this closing remark: 123 minutes of my life I am never going to get back..

But don't me wrong, if you're one of those people like myself, you enjoy watching what I call 'Good-Bad movies.' The ones that are just so awesomely poor-quality, you can't help but watch. The list of Good-Bad movies includes the most recent Godzilla with Matthew Broderick, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, In the Army Now with Pauly Shore and yes, you guessed it: Branagh's Frankenstein.

What do I think about re-animation? Well it's not really the most economical thing in the world. If this kind of technology was ever considered normal and we just brought people back to life for a price, this whole overpopulation fiasco wouldn't be helped much, would it? I'm not one to be hindered by religious views and such and I guess you can now tell that I don't really mind talking about it. I think that bringing the dead back to life is just a waste of time and energy, not a horrible abomination. The knowledge and time that would go into those studies could easily have been devoted for looking for a cure for AIDS.

I don't think Mary Shelley would have liked for her story to be overdone so much to the point where it isn't a scary tale any longer. And that's exactly where we've come. I felt myself laughing at way more parts of the film that the original author intended. But I suppose that is solely attributed to the fact that Kenneth Branagh's interpretation is just downright funny. Either way, I wish Frankenstein still was a chilling story you could tell around a campfire. Kids, or just humans in general just aren't afraid of the same things as we used to be. Mary wanted to make a story that scared the pants off of people and it did... in the 1800's. In no way am I say I wouldn't pee myself if a 7' tall reanimate man came chasing after me. Because I would. There would also be girly screams.

A while back I was sent a link to a Russian Propaganda film that showed them bringing back to life a dog but many factors in the video proved to be impossible. For example how they brought back the head of a dog and it was able to move it's face without being connected to the body. (The neck muscles would have been required to do what the dog did) Enough of my poor explanation, here is the video:

Click me!
(Might not be suitable for the squeamish)

As for my first Sci Fi log.. I hope this was a success. I feel like the fact that this is a blog leaves room for a little more humor and random thought.

-Jamie
The truth is out there...

Intro.

Hi, I'm Jamie. I'm 17, I go to high school, I'm quite Canadian and I enjoy maple syrup and bacon(yes, that includes together). I've decided to start blogging for a couple reasons: the first is that I'm required to keep a log for my Science Fiction class; the second is that I've always wanted to get into blogging, here's my chance.

So please bear with me through ridiculously long run-on sentences, embarrassing side tracks, rants, and the constant overuse of the glorious ellipsis. Enjoy?