The Zuper Zealous Zoologist of Zany Zanes is a gargantuan, cultured nation, ruled by Zenthos with an iron fist, and remarkable for its compulsory military service, soft-spoken computers, and punitive income tax rates. The hard-working, cynical population of 11.772 billion Zany Zanesians are ruled by a mostly-benevolent dictator, who grants the populace the freedom to live their own lives but watches carefully for anyone to slip up.

The large, well-organized government juggles the competing demands of Education, Administration, and Defense. It meets to discuss matters of state in the capital city of Pop. The average income tax rate is 59.1%, and even higher for the wealthy.

The strong Zany Zanesian economy, worth 666 trillion Z's a year, is driven entirely by a combination of government and state-owned industry, with private enterprise illegal. The industrial sector, which is quite specialized, is led by the Information Technology industry, with significant contributions from Book Publishing, Arms Manufacturing, and Retail. Average income is 56,615 Z's, and distributed extremely evenly, with little difference between the richest and poorest citizens.

School uniforms are compulsory, teams of painters are converting road signs from horse lengths to kilometers, intellectual snobbery has the cognoscenti sneering at anyone who doesn't have an opinion on the semiological drift of Umberto Eco's works, and fifteen-year-olds cannot walk younger siblings to school without a professional Childcare and Education Certificate. Crime, especially youth-related, is totally unknown, thanks to a well-funded police force and progressive social policies in education and welfare. Zany Zanes's national animal is the Zebra, which frolics freely in the nation's many lush forests, and its national religion is Zen.

Zany Zanes is ranked 239,511^th in the world and 58^th in The Bar on the corner of every region for Highest Unexpected Death Rate, scoring 26.39 on the Bus Surprisal Index.