This art by Viria13 is one of my favourite images of the Doctor and his companion. For me the 10th Doctor and Rose is a beautiful love story and one I will watch over and over again. For me this image captures the role Rose played in supporting him overcome his personal demons and helping him love again. Yeah soppy I know, I'll admit it I am a big romantic.
Viria13 has many many more wonderful and magical Dr Who related artwork and I urge to take a look. HERE
First off I wouldn’t recommend a shopping trip within the first two weeks of the outbreak, chances are your local supermarket will be full of cashiers wandering around gnawing on the rotting meats of the butcher counters and happy go lucky customers doing their weekly shop are now roaming up and down the aisle hoping to find some canned brain, all in all not a safe place to be. And that's assuming the zombie outbreak was fast and extremely contagious with a very short incubation period. If it has been a slower process then the likely hood is that your local shops have been trashed by the initial panic buying followed quickly by the inevitable looting.
General rules of food consumption in this scenario should for your family and you to gorge on the fridge and freezer food, no harm in building up some stored fat much like a bear preparing to hibernate. No heating means cold nights a layer of fat adds a little comfort. Though please note excessive weight gain will impact the chances of survival when running for your life. Next eat the fresh products, bread, biscuits, fruit and vegetables. All providing essential energy and vitamins to once again prepare you for the chaotic times ahead.
But that said clearly the most sensible option would be to plan ahead. The difficulty with this is storage, you start to fill your house with masses of food then you’ll quickly become the crazy person who lives on the corner with chickens and cows in their backyard. So here are a few key items to keep in your larder to aid the transition into the new apocalyptic, run for your life kinda world.
Bottled Water (obviously)
Mmmm hydration
It goes without saying that you’ve already filled your bath and any other containers with water and moment you learnt of the ‘mysterious virus spreading across the world bringing the dead to life’. This will need to be used for personal hygiene, toileting as well as assigning some for drinking. But it is always a good idea to have some bottled water. For a start it will remain clean and free from contamination, handy for not only drinking but cleaning wounds (Please note: this is not zombie bites, don’t bother cleaning the dudes arm up, beat him over the head until his skull collapses and his brains pour out, he’s a goner anyway). About six large bottle will set you up until the two week lock down is over.
Canned Food (again obviously)
Many many foods come in the form of a can. From the classic baked beans and soup to chilli or a full breakfast and not forgetting fruit and vegetables. Canned food has a shelf life of anywhere between one to five years and therefore the most convenient way of getting daily sustenance without risking botulism or salmonella. Plus they are cheap and chances you already have a small supply from your weekly shop. Adding one or two extra to that shop won’t financially cripple you.
Whilst I recommend a range of soups and vegetables. My number one choice is baked beans.Considered a super food they are packed with protein, fibre, iron and calcium. As well as being one of your five a day they are also not too bad eaten cold. One last thing, make sure you have a can opener.
Rice
A big bag of dried rice is a must. Rice is the staple food for more than half of the world’s population. It offers complex carbohydrates which provide a slower and more sustained release of energy than simple carbohydrates. White rice is one of the quickest easiest foods to digest and is often recommended for those who are debilitated and weak and require easy assimilation and quick energy, an inevitable side effect of a zombie apocalypse. Down side is that rice does require boiling so fire is a must. But worry not here is a video on Urban survival, how to light a fire:
Salt
There is nothing like a pinch of salt to vastly improve the blandness of your apocalypse menu and brighten your day but it’s a lot handier then this. As salt inhibits the growth of microorganisms humans have been salting meat to preserve it since ancient times. So if you’re not quite hungry enough to eat the whole cat, salt a little for later. Please bear in mind though that you will probably require a reliable water supply before setting up your salted meat emporium, the sodium in salt plays a part in triggering thirst mechanisms meaning chances are you’ll require a drink after chowing down on salted squirrel.
There are many other uses for salt, some irrelevant, I don’t think anyone is going to be too worried about keeping their fresh cut flowers blooming for longer, but some handier such as using it to brush your teeth. You can find out more about the uses from the Salt Institute.
The Essentials!
So there it is, the basics. I'd also add a range of spices and may be some dried lentils, a little powdered mash potato and super noodles, you know just to shake it up a bit. Also handy would be a big box of matches and some multi vitamins and iron supplements.
I have been roleplay gaming with my husband and friends for 14 years and I love it so it only seemed natural to introduce our children to it when they became a suitable age. They have for many years looked at our funny shaped dice waiting for the day they would be able to touch them. Finally we allowed it, my best friend them Gurumel has the D&D adventure First Quest so we all decided to start there.
The first session involved only my daughter, my son was 3 and harder to get focused. Maddie (8) surprised me by being really really creative and imaginative and completely relaxed. To her it was just another game. When I first started playing, aged 18, I was much more reserved and in some cases terrified. It was something completely new to me and nothing I'd even heard of so it took me sometime to settle down and get into the flow. The advantage of being a child is that you can act silly in front of everyone without fear of being judged or laughed at for the wrong reason. Doing that as an adult is hard.
Within minutes of the session starting she was trash talking a group of gnolls:
"I'm going to walk you to the river tie a stone around you and throw you in, you smell like a dog"
This disturbed me a little I won't lie, but we all laughed and laughed and she continued to come with ideas that made me so proud. Ideas such as cutting the meat off the dead gnolls so we can eat it later. We then had the age old debate about eating meat from talking animals and she agreed not to, but I am proud nonetheless that it crossed her mind, and she was right we didn't have any food.
In her second session this weekend, she decided to trash talk a giant toad, along the lines of "I'm going to cut off your legs and feed them to the french" instead she stabbed it through the head with her quarterstaff, job done. It was in this session that Xander, now 4, got interested.
He wanted to roll the dice more than any other aspect of the experience so he became Slinker the thief. Whilst his attention wasn't always in the game he certainly listened for the combat. In one particular combat the DM announced a room with 4 Hobgloblins and played the track on the CD. This was his reaction, followed by tears, followed by backstabbing one to death.
It was beautiful to see both of my children playing and enjoying the fun to be had in a world of imagination. They have done me proud and it's a better start to their roleplay gaming life then I could have hoped for. I am certain there will be many more good times ahead and I will update folks as and when.
