And thus, a zombie.

Now that November has pretty much gotten away from me -- a joint effort made by both my day job and the excruciating demands of NaNoWriMo -- and the holidays are nearly upon us, I think it's about time we got back to business.

So let's talk about zombies.  Or, rather, zombie walks.

If there was ever a way to really see what, exactly, epitomizes a zombie in our modern culture, it would have to be the zombie walk.  There, one can see zombies of all types, from the blue ones to the bloody ones, the vocal ones to the brain-mantra'd ones, the ones with poor motor control to the ones who run marathons.  Every kind of zombie seen in movies, books, and games (at least, the ones released post-Romero) is there, and in fine form.

The first zombie walk on record was held in Sacramento, California in August of 2001 -- thirty-three years after "Night of the Living Dead" hit the big screen, but shortly before zombies went up in popularity in the mid-2000s -- and was held as a means of promoting a midnight film festival (thanks, Wikipedia!).  Since then, other walks have emerged.  In 2003, Toronto held the first non-promotional zombie walk.  Although that walk only had six participants, including the organizers, the event is now annual and attracts upward of six thousand zombies.  The Toronto walk received a great deal of publicity, and the non-promotional walk spread across Canada, into the United States, and overseas, and it, of course, grew exponentially each year.  Now there are zombie pub-crawls, proms, and beach parties (because even zombies have the right to a great tan).

I've never actually participated in a zombie walk, but I've been audience to a handful of them.  Of course, I never come prepared with a camera, but I'm lucky to have friends who do.  One such friend was with me for the Silver Spring Zombie Walk.  She took a few videos, which she posted on her blog, and a mess of pictures, which she didn't.  The clip in the linked post show just a few of the many, many zombies that showed up to stumble down the street, but even so there are a great many zombiaic interpretations -- just take a look!

Another friend of mine went to a walk in Florida and sent me over a hundred fabulous pictures.  There's definitely a different feel to this walk -- to begin with, it took place during the day! -- but the idea is still there.  Any kind of zombie you want to find, you'll find it at a zombie walk.

Want to find a Zombie Walk near you?  Check out the Crawl Calendar at CrawloftheDead.com!