Run For Your Lives!!!

With Halloween right around the corner—well, close enough, anyway—the horror fan in me rejoices for a season where I no longer have to look for sheepish excuses to repeatedly play Dawn of the Dead, Evil Dead II, & Shaun of the Dead (or any number of movies with dead in the title really*); I can just do it without having to worry about being thought of as some sort of social deviant, for 'tis the season to be jolly...

But what's a running enthusiast to do during the autumnal equinox? Well...here on the horizon, coming to a Baltimore near you, we have Run For Your Lives, a fun looking 5-K race that embraces those basic survival instincts one might require during a zombie apocalypse. While I'm wearing my incredulous cap that the promo video might not be quite accurate to the actual event, I am intrigued that the event coordinators have seemingly found a way to blend the increasing popularity of mud running with the fantasy fulfilling horror thrills of a haunted hayride, but, presumably, without the tractor.

As I personally won't be able to participate in this run come October—I'll be half marathon & full marathoning my way through the streets of Tokyo & Osaka, respectively—I'm extremely interested in how they pull off this event. I'm hoping for its success to spread like the zombie plague, so that someday I'll have a chance to test my mettle against the pretend undead, you know, before the real thing is upon us. I am slightly reeling from sticker shock of the admittance fee on what is just a 5-K ($67!), but I also expect this to be one of the more unique running experiences of the year. It might be one of the few races that coming in last place, means you probably had the most fun, since, with multiple paths to choose from, you finish either as a survivor or a zombie**.

For more information go to the official site: here.

In the meantime, people looking to participate may want to brush up on their living dead knowledge by reading through Max Brook's The Zombie Survival Guide & World War Z. After that, maybe a viewing of The Adventures of Milo & Otis is mandatory. Not because it has anything to do with Zombies, but because after all this bleakness, what could be more appropriate to cleanse the palate than a quaint narrated tale of a puppy & kitten who fast become lifelong best friends?

Footnotes:
*Except for Dead Man Walking; that movie was nothing like I thought it was going to be.

**I am rather curious what the appetite of a vegan turned zombie would be. I posit that zombies crave brains because the human head is melon shaped, therefore a vegan zombie would raid the pumpkin patch—where Linus awaits the arrival of the Great Pumpkin—sinking his or her teeth deep into hordes of gourds found within.