Things Moms Can Do to Prepare for the Zombie Apocalypse, the Alien Invasion, and all other End of the World scenarios by Pamela Francis

Maybe things start with the movies…, or maybe they start in real life and the movies simply project preliminary plausibilities out to us all so we won’t be terribly surprised or upset when the horrors actually do manifest…, but either way, there’s a chance there WILL be a) a zombie apocalypse, b) an alien invasion, and/or c) some end-of-the-world cataclysm involving the loss of data and the malfunctionality of all things technological.

I remember leaving the country in 1999 in preparation for the much-feared, slash anticipated, Y2K calamity we’d all been promised would take place that year.  I arranged to be on an island off the coast of South America from December 7 thru January 10 just to give it a wide berth, because, hey, “I’m too important to be captured” and my Madam Yes sensibilities had told me to find somewhere fun and sexy to be while the rest of the unfortunate yahoos figured it out.  Get it…? Unfortunate Yahoos…? Anyway…

Since then I have come to realize that Y2K fantasies of worldwide data bases being wiped out (and my $90,000 student loan debt vanishing into thin air never to be brought up again) would likely never take place.  And even the triumphant return of the Messiah, advertised and promoted for some 2,000 years, could turn out to be a cancelled event.  After all, “stakeholders”, a.k.a. “the Ruling Class”, a.k.a. “the 1%”, a.k.a. “them rich mickey-fickeys” were still out there digging up ground, laying down foundations, and building new shyte everywhere I turned, so how could the world be coming to an end if Operation Gentrification America, et. al were still erecting fabulous structures poor people and Blacks aren’t welcomed in…, I reasoned.

So, yeah.  No true end of the world seemed feasible.

Still, like I was saying in the beginning, I got to ruminating again in chicken and the egg fashion about whether cataclysmic events happen AFTER the movies are made about them, or just preceding.  If uncomfortable realities are already in the making, and Hollywood’s REAL job is to help us wrap our heads around them by selling us tickets and popcorn to the previews of it…, then that would mean —

{you can check out now and I won’t be insulted.  This is, after all, a rumination LOL}

…that would mean… that if there IS a Zombie Apocalypse in the works, it won’t be because there’s an actual Zombie species somewhere out there watching World War Z and taking notes, rather, the creators of World War Z wanted to give us a different way to look at the meth addict, slash homelessness, epidemic that would make us feel oddly cast in such a production every time we walked outside our doors and stumbled into any number of beleaguered neighborhoods where once only bus stops and freeway overpasses stood.

So here’s what I want to impart to moms.  If there’s gonna be an alien invasion, it’s gonna happen while our kids are in a youtube induced stupor.  Yeah, mamas, aliens will be able to take over this society without so much as lifting a spiny dendrite because our offspring will be too busy watching DanTDM.  Sad Face emoji.

And the way I’ve come to look at it, the tented homeless who now line the streets of L.A. (wow.  can’t seem to escape this.  it used to be Times Square when I was a kid.) are really what I call The First Responders of the Apocalypse™.  They are the ones pioneering a “successful” existence void of electricity, running water, or brick-and-mortar housing.  They are the ones who will show us how to live without an Amazon Firestick or a Sleep Number bed.

Our job as moms…, the way we can help…, is to…

Top 5 list, please…

1. Dial back on the surfing/acting/coding camps this summer, and enroll your kids in a good old fashioned handwriting class.  When all the keyboards and touch screens go, they’re gonna need to know how to hold a writing implement again some day.

2. Put your kids to work getting your family’s personal data backed up on paper in handwritten notes using skills sharpened in aforementioned handwriting classes.  I know none of you can recite anyone’s actual telephone number from your contacts list, and so I’m fairly certain your kids don’t know their addresses, their socials, or how to get to Dear Aunt Sally’s house on foot, either.

3. Take your kids on a field trip to neighborhoods where the population is now officially living outdoors.  Now I don’t know where all those people went who used to live on Manhattan’s streets before Guiliani got a hold of them, but that would make a great research project titled: “Where did all those people who used to live outside Port Authority go?”

4. –WAIT!!

I just figured it out.  They’re the zombies…!

Tags: #alien invasion, #cataclysmic events, #end of the world, #hollywood's real purpose, #Y2K calamity, #zombie apocalypse