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Being undead is a challenge. First of all, there is not really any good way to look presentable. Imean, I don't look alive. With no pulse I have no red color, but I am not rotting, so I am not gray.People say that I look either anemic, jaundiced, or both. Those that would know ask if I havebeen a drug addict, or if I am currently one. That is not the case. My eyes, what color can still beseen at the edges of my dialated pupils, are now gray. They lost their color a long time ago. Thewhites are a uniform iodine yellow. They are also sunken, with permanant dark circlesunderneath. My cheeks are also drawn but not so much as to seem starved. They are thecheeks of someone who is deathly ill, however. My teeth are sparkling white because I havecaps on, but without them, they are brown and dead. My skin is tough with the feel of chamois.Like supple leather, it stretches and bends but does not wrinkle or tear easily. My body is leanand appears to be almost starved. It hasn't changed much since I died. My hands and feet,however , are shrivelled. The skin, sinew and muscle is gathered up tight against the bone andmy dead, black nails, for some reason, continue to grow. They have become hard, almost likeclaws, and it takes tin snips to keep them trimmed to human standards. Similarly, my hair continues to grow, but it is whispy and white, and has been for years. There is currently nothingbut fuzz up there now. I shave it and wear a wig because I look really old with hair like that.I have discovered that I will never wrinkle or grow old, but that does not mean much. it really isnothing to seek after. Here is what I have to do to get myself to look normal:Makeup: this is extensive. Working as an extra and as a stunt person, I have had the oppertunityto learn to apply stage makeup. I am possibly one of the few people who can justify airbrushedmakeup. Then there are the full eye contacts. These are the ones used in movies that cover upthe pupil and the white. Actors loathe them because they hurt, but since I cannot feel pain, and Iwill never suffer infection or blindness, I wear them to cover my sickly eyes and my pupils. thecolored contacts help me stand the light. I usually get them in darker colors. Then i have theselittle things I put in my cheeks so they are not so sunken. It usually does not matter if I amwearing them or not because I do not eat normally. FInally, I put on scent of some kind. Though Ido not rot, as I have said, I do not smell good. Mostly, I have the scent of meat that is fresh, buthas not been allowed oxygen: that is slightly sulferous with a hint of bloodClothes: I usually wear full clothing. That means head to toe clothes and gloves for my hands.Yeah, I know that is sort of odd to wear them all the time, but its either that or freak people out.That and i never know if I am carrying something. After all, when you touch me, you are touchingwalking carrion. In the winter, it does not change much, but it does give me an excuse to wear ascarf and hood. Since I don't have a core temperature, coats really don't do me any good. Myfavorite article of clothing is a baggy black hoodiefood: I do not need to eat, drink, breathe or sleep. That is not to say that I cannot do thesethings, but simply that I do not require them. I breathe to talk, to smoke a cigarette or toextinguish a flame, but I do not need to take in oxygen.I do not require liquid but I do benefit from either drinking. I dessicate, to be sure, and for a whilein the fifties I went for years without liquid. That resulted in my body just shrivelling like a rasin. Idon't die from it, its not painful, but it does slow me down. After a while, I start moving at ashuffling pace, as my muscles lose their ability to stretch. I once scared the crap out of a bunchof tourists because I had been doing my own little tour of the Valley of Kings. It doesn't take longto dessicate me in the desert, and I admit, I may have been treasure hunting. It is easier to hunttreasure when one doesn't need to worry about stale air. Walking out of a tomb with a headdressfrom an annubite priest, covered in gold and dessicated from the desert, well, Misunderstandingshappen. At least I got away without having to explain myself.I find, however, that drinking blood hydrates me better than drinking any other liquid. It puts color in my skin for a while too. I have arrangements with certain coroners and morticians to discreetlygive me the blood drained from bodies because of all blood out there human blood satisfies thebest. I know for a fact vampires will not touch the stuff, but it is one of the things I do enjoy thatdoes not need to be fresh from a human. I leave the victimisation of the living to vampires, who
 
seem to need only the freshest blood. For me, actually, any blood will do.I do get drunk from alcohol, and I will drink water when I need it. Most of the time I don't bother. Ican also recieve my hydation by immersion, but I have to be careful, because if i let myself soakfor too long in water, I get bloated, and then, of course I walk around like something dredged froma river, with all the stink of it to boot. For that reason, I don't do as some suggest, and personallyinvestigate shipwrecks. I tried that for a while. It was not pleasant, especially when there aresharks. I attract predatory fish, probably because I smeall like dead meat.As for food, I do not require it, but it is a comfort and a pleasure, and though I will never die fromstarvation, I do hunger. Sometimes, especially after a few years without food, I will lapse into afrenzy, where I go about eating anything that even hints of rot. In a state like that, my higher functions are supressed, so I tend to avoid starvation. Fortunately, there is almost alwaysoppertunity to eat. I am not like humans, who require fresh food. Anything dead will do.I cannot eat plant matter and I cannot eat cooked flesh. That means no cereal grains, novegetables, no fruits, no seasonings other than salt, and that eating out is really not convenient.It really doesn't matter. I have lost all of my normal sense of taste. What really tastes good is theindividual flavors of the bacteria and insect larvae that grows in carrion. It is indescribable to thehuman pallate. I know it is nasty to you, but the mere scent of decayed flesh piques my interest.Decayed human is no differnt from decayed animal,really. It is fresh human that has distinction.Fresh human flesh is an addiction that I have to exist with because it is a vital medicinal tonic tomy body. I have to be careful, however, because I cannot throw up. I have never once filled upon raw meat, but if I get cooked meat or plant matter, it sits in my stomach until I cut open mybelly and physically extract it.At home, my refridgerator contains my sealed gallons of blood, much the way that the livingkeeps milk, which is also there, along with yogurt, cheeses, sour cream and fish. I tend to get thestuff thats almost expired, and leave the fresher groceries to humans. I also keep eggs in there.I eat those raw as well. I have an ice chest, but I never keep it cold. That is where I keep mymeat. Because it is sealed, I can avoid disturbing my neighbors, but the way I like my meatwould have the cops over here regularly to investigate suspicious smells.Climate: I enjoy the same temperature that the living enjoy, though my tolerable range is a bithigher than average. I can stand heat to 145 degrees farenheit, but after that, I am more likely tocook, which is never good. Cooking me, I believe, is one way I could die. Cooked parts just stopworking untill I can find someone to eat and so replace the part. I avoid anything below freezing,becaue I freeze as well.I cannot die from freezing solid, but it is inconvenient.As the temperaturedrops, I move slower as well, just like any exothermic creature. I prefer to migrate to the tropicsduring the winter. Most undead do, given the chance.WInters are incredibly dificult for me. Once, in '77, I was jumped by a mugger and fell into a pondI was so cold that I could not move quickly enough to escape the water before it refroze. I was azombe popsicle until spring. Someone found me befor I regained conciousness and the coroner at the morgue I was taken to laid me out for an autopsy and let me thaw. I had to explain myself to him once he got over the shock of seeing a corpse rise up. In the case that I have to survive awinter where it freezes, I blow my budget on those chem heat packs just so that I do not gotorpid.That brings me to sleep. I do not sleep, naturally. The only thing that comes close is beingfrozen. I do dream when I am frozen. It is akin to the same sort of sleep vampires get during theday.WEll, that's about it for my lifestyle, I hope you understand better how much of a pain in the ass itis to be undead. I personally hhope none of the living reading my post get to being in my state, or 
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Tyger Burch

I thought this was a fun entry into the series you're putting together, it needed a little work in my opinion with spelling and maybe even diving more into specific situations. As a tip I would say your character development skills are good but you would need to work more on developing them through the situation rather than flat out telling us about him. I was more expecting something that was like Dec 4th, this is what happened today but this was a very, very clever way to introduce us to a new character. I enjoyed it and look forward to reading more.

reply05 / 06 / 2009
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