One of the great things about being an SF writer here and now is seeing how widely our tropes have scattered into the public consciousness. I had to go out on an errand this morning, and drove by the local med school, and I did a double-take to see a bunch of walking dead! Because hey, what better way to spend a Saturday morning than as a groaning shambling corpse with a bunch of buddies? They must have been up for hours, too: I didn’t get too close a look as I drove by, but some of their costumes looked really good.

Admittedly, this is a college campus, but it’s kinda neat to sit back and think about the way these things just become accepted. It’s getting to the point where those of us who grew up with speculative fiction increasingly identify with the popular imagination. If I had a mind to, I could strike up a conversation with a stranger about Batman, vampires, faster-than-light travel, or Harry Potter and there’s a good chance of finding a good half hour’s intellectual repast there.

Or maybe I’m reading too much into the things people do to amuse themselves on a Saturday morning. Is a zombie is just a zombie?