Its only a matter of time before the undead take over the world. Whether it comes from a influenza, rabies hybrid infection, or perhaps some end of the world voodoo will cause the world to turn into flesh eating zombies. Either way, our only hope is to survive this thing, because there is no preventing it. The most important thing to remember about living in a zombie infested world is that you must have a safe and reliable home. Just think to every zombie movie you have ever seen, does anyone ever actually stay in one place long enough? Every single one of these movies have the remaining humans try a ridiculous escape to somewhere they believe will be a better place. Just know that better place will always be un-attainable as long as the army of decomposers still roams around. So take the proper precautions of zombie proofing your own home, so that you can wait this thing out until either the zombies of all been eliminated, or most likely they decompose.

Step one: Learn the art of coupons.

This may sound silly at first, but stay with me for a second. Even when a cast of characters in the worst of zombie situations have a secure place to live, someone always gets infected when it comes time to go out and get supplies. This is when coupons come into play. In a perfect world, these people would never have to leave their homes just to get some grape soda and peroxide while zombies are crawling up the front stairs. No, with the proper use of couponing, all you would have to do is go down to your humongous stockpile that coupons have helped you attain, and hopefully you have enough to last throughout the apocalypse. You would probably need enough supplies to last either 6 months to a year. This is depending on where you live and what time of year it is when the zombies attack. Say you live in a colder climate and zombies come a’ calling around Christmas time. These guys wont last long roaming around in whatever they were wearing when they turned. A normal person can barely stand to be outside in the cold for a couple of hours, imagine if you were in your birthday suit and you were outside for a week. Now the timeframe of how long you will be held up could be longer depending on the climate. But if it is too hot, this wouldn’t help the zombies either because they would be swelling up in the heat. Either way the safest thing to do is have you stash of supplies ready to go at a moments notice. And don’t feel bad about being greedy, no zombie ever spared someone’s life because of how noble they were. No body likes a hero so just save yourself.

Step two: Yard work

I don’t mean mow your grass and trim the bushes. I’m talking put up a sturdy fence, prison style. You want something far enough away from your home so that when the zombie flesh is shredded by barbwire, you wont have to smell it. To go that extra mile you may want to think about adding a moat. Everyone knows zombies can’t swim and are too stupid to stay out of the water. Just add a nice drainage system, cause no one wants to look at all those bodies floating outside their bedroom window. Don’t forget to add in a drawbridge as well, because once the apocalypse is over, no one would swim through that mess. With the proper fence, and for those going the extra mile of adding a moat, you could also enjoy a nice patio and still have the occasional cook out, because the odds of the zombies making it to your front door are slim to none.

Step three: Reinforce Doors and Windows

While its doubtful that any zombies manage cross the moat and then scale the fence without killing themselves. It would be a good idea to reinforce all ground level doors and windows. In fact, it would be a good idea to just take out any form of ground level access to the outside world and put a nice layer of concrete block up. To enter and exit your home, perhaps a rope ladder to an upstairs balcony, at least until its safe to tear down the concrete block. Should the zombies make it across the moat, up the fence they probably wont be able to form an orderly line to make it up one single rope ladder.

Step four: weapons and panic room

Now just in case all the precautionary measures don’t hold the hoards back, it is just plain smart to have a well equipped panic room to fall back to. In fact, instead of a panic room, make it a panic basement. You want room to stretch your legs and I don’t blame you for that. Make sure that all the video cameras your have installed are in working order, because nothing is worse that sitting in your panic room and watching the zombies roam your house and then the camera’s go out. Also, no zombie prepared house is complete is without an armory of weapons. And don’t mess around when it comes to ammo and weapons, we need assault rifles and shotguns. If you’re everyday redneck can take an AK-47 deer hunting, then you should have one stored in the basement with enough ammo to take on your city’s population in case you’re the last man standing. And don’t just get one of each and call it a day, because guns jam and I don’t know about you, but I’m not gun repair man and I don’t want any misfires when I’m taking out some zombies. While you’re at it, go ahead and splurge on the .50 cal sniper rifle so you can take up America’s favorite zombie apocalypse past time of sniping zombies from your roof.

Step five: candles, generator and board games.

In the wake of all the chaos, its doubtful your electric provider will keep service running to your home. A generator will be helpful here, it may not last forever, so use sparingly. Make sure you have plenty of things to fill up the long hours of waiting, and something to drown out the sound of mindless moaning that is sure to be coming from the depths of your moat. Don’t forget to stock up on some DVDs because cable will most likely go out before the madness finally ends. Keep a radio and hopefully there will be some renegade like you who has survived and broadcasts his message of hope across the airwaves. CB radios are a good plan too, not just so you can listen in on dirty trucker jokes, but so you can have conversations with others out there in the world to keep from losing your mind.  when all else fails, play solitaire with a deck of 51 cards until you finally win, then you can come out of hiding.

Follow all these steps and you will be one of the few to survive the zombie apocalypse. It may be expensive, but what is money when your life is at stake, plus think about all the free stuff there will be once everyone is a zombie. You wont have to pay for anything, so it all cancels out in the end.