Twilight: Hot! Google! Action!

Content Note: Witch-Hunts, Persecution of Minorities

Twilight Recap: Bella has been told by Jacob Black that the Cullens are vampires and that Jacob's clan descended from werewolves. Subsequently, she has gone home, gone to bed, and has dreamed that Edward is a vampire and Jacob is a werewolf.

Twilight, Chapter 7: Nightmare

This is the chapter so many of you have been waiting for: the Google chapter. The chapter that thrills, chills, and leaves you wanting so much more. I know it did for me, anyway! Let's dive right into it. And let's also keep in mind that I'm writing this at 9 pm on Friday night having spent most of my day dealing with AT&T and trying to coax them to give me my phone line and internet back. So this one may not be as highly polished as all my posts, but I hope we have fun anyway. Wheeee!

   My light was still on, and I was sitting fully dressed on the bed, with my shoes on. I glanced, disoriented, at the clock on my dresser. It was five-thirty in the morning.
   I groaned, fell back, and rolled over onto my face, kicking off my boots. I was too uncomfortable to get anywhere near sleep, though. I rolled back over and unbuttoned my jeans, yanking them off awkwardly as I tried to stay horizontal. I could feel the braid in my hair, an uncomfortable ridge along the back of my skull.

I go back and forth on how to feel about this passage. On the one hand, it's a description of a main character that has been nicely inserted into the action, which is always difficult to do. On the other hand, it comes seven chapters in and has the effect of disorienting me entirely. Bella wears boots? As a Texan, I feel obligated to point out here that there are many different kinds of boots. This makes me want to grip the sides of my reader, pull it up to my face, and ask WHAT KIND OF BOOTS ARE YOU WEARING, BELLA? I don't know about Arizona and Washington, but this stuff matters in Texas.

This may also finally solve the mystery of why Bella falls over constantly. If you buy the really stiff boots that don't have any treads on the bottom, you can fall over from a standing position under the right conditions. I have done this.

And apparently she wears a braid! Which... must have been for the benefit of the hiking trip, because she's been doing the "hair curtain" with Edward in school. Except that -- as Chris the Cynic pointed out -- Bella doesn't strike me as the kind of person to change her hairstyle very often, so that's a bit disorienting. So it's nice that we're getting character description as part of the action, but they're utterly confusing character description.

   It was all no use, of course. My subconscious had dredged up exactly the images I’d been trying so desperately to avoid. I was going to have to face them now.

I think this means that her subconscious had dredged up images of vampires and werewolves and she has to face them now, but this doesn't make a whole lot of immediate sense to me. For starters, Bella didn't really see a werewolf in the "walks on two legs" traditional sense; she saw a wolf standing where Jacob had once been. And she doesn't deal with that image at all -- werewolves will be forgotten until the next book, and by then Bella will have done a completely brain wipe on the subject, if I recall correctly.

For seconds, Bella didn't really see much in the way of a vampire, either. She saw Edward in the green hazy light of the forest, "faintly glowing" and with black eyes. The only thing sort of vampiric about him was the pointed teeth (all of them, or just the incisors? AND WHAT KIND OF BOOTS DOES HE WEAR?) that showed when he smiled. I guess that's enough and I'm just being terribly picky to even mention it, but it just doesn't seem like enough of an earth-shattering dream to leave Bella this shaky and reticent to face facts. I've had worse dreams, is what I think I'm saying.

Anyway, we wrestle my attention away from the above ramble to point out that Bella doesn't "face them now", she goes and has a shower and then tidies up her room in order to build up the suspense of her not facing the vampire issue. I want to blow past all that because it's dull, except to note that this:

   I couldn’t tell if Charlie was still asleep, or if he had already left. I went to look out my window, and the cruiser was gone. Fishing again.

...made me laugh because I immediately thought of Bekabot's comment from last week. Have I told you all this week that I love ya'll? Because I totally do. *grins*

   I couldn’t put it off any longer. I went to my desk and switched on my old computer.
   I hated using the Internet here. My modem was sadly outdated, my free service substandard; just dialing up took so long that I decided to go get myself a bowl of cereal while I waited.

Having been on the phone with AT&T all week for over five total hours and counting even as I write this post on Friday night, I feel Bella's pain. I would like to take this opportunity to make a public service announcement: do not use AT&T if you can use anything else, including those little tin can phones connected to each other via strings. Because you'll get the same level of customer service with either, without the added migraine that AT&T throws in free of charge!

Back to Twilight.

Twilight was written in 2003 and published in 2005. I don't even remember 2005 clearly -- I'm pretty sure that was the year I went back to college for my engineering degree. I'm pretty sure computers were past the "expensive toy" stage and edging firmly into the "basic necessity" phase for a number of middle class Americans as jobs and services increasingly started to go online. (Thank you for calling AT&T. All representatives are currently busy. You can receive help online at AT&T.com...)

And so I find myself wondering just how much my privilege colors my understanding of the text. My first thought is to wonder why Charlie doesn't have a decent internet service provider. But that sounds awfully privileged! Is there not one physically available to his home in Forks? Is he just not interested in the internet? But... he's the chief of police. And I'd like to believe that the chief of police, even in a small town, would be interested enough in the news to get a decent internet connection. Can he maybe not afford one? Or does he just get the news from the television? But does Forks get anything besides the local channels? AND WHAT KIND OF BOOTS DO THE NEWSCASTERS WEAR?

   With another sigh, I turned to my computer. Naturally, the screen was covered in pop-up ads. I sat in my hard folding chair and began closing all the little windows. 

Bella Swan has just booted up her computer, and it's now immediately covered in pop-up windows. If her story is set in 2004, she should have the Windows service pack that first introduced a pop-up blocker to Internet Explorer (I doubt Bella is using Opera or Firefox), so I have to assume she has some kind of virus, which is just short of possible since she doesn't really seem to be much of a computer person. But to not even be able to see the screen behind all the pop-up ads sounds pretty virulent -- has she hit some kind of ad-storm somehow?

Is she using AOL? Is that the problem? I remember horror stories from friends in college who used AOL. Are there any AOL-users who can speak up on this?

   Eventually I made it to my favorite search engine. I shot down a few more pop-ups and then typed in one word.
   Vampire.

Wait, does her favorite search engine page also have pop-up ads? I'm putting my money on 'virus'.

Now, I can guess what some of you are thinking: Why is Ana spending so much time on these stupid pop-up ads? And if you're thinking that, I feel your pain! But the book spends a tremendous amount of time on pop-up ads, which means they must be important, right? Right??

They've got to be related in some way to the world-building, there to give us some kind of insight into the characters of Bella and Charlie. Or maybe they're some kind of metaphor for Bella's intensely-focused drive to be with Edward, regardless of all the transient distractions that throw themselves in her way: Jacob, Mike, Eric, Tyler, college, that sort of thing.

Because I'm starting to feel like the pop-up ads are the only here in order to provide some kind of action to the chapter. (She shot them down!) And surely that's too cynical to contemplate.

   It took an infuriatingly long time, of course. When the results came up, there was a lot to sift through -- everything from movies and TV shows to role-playing games, underground metal, and gothic cosmetic companies.

Wikipedia was launched in 2001, but I can't rightly tell you if they were the top search-engine result for one-word queries like "vampire" in 2004. Nor can I tell you if Google was at that time tracking search queries and trying to optimize results to users. I am guessing they were not, but it would be amusing in Bella's case if they were, because that would mean that gothic cosmetics came back as a higher result for her than an online encyclopedia, which would mean we have two examples in this chapter of character descriptions coming in through the action. BUT WHAT KIND OF BOOTS DO YOU WEAR WITH YOUR GOTHIC MAKEUP? Well, actually, these kind.

And of course all this is moot if Twilight is actually set in the distant past. Carlisle has a cell phone, but those are older than some might think. Can anyone call up some technological aspects of Twilight to help carbon date this book? Or maybe via the car models?

WAIT. I just remembered I have the Twilight Official Illustrated Guide. Hang on.

NAME: Isabella Marie Swan Cullen; preferred name: Bella
DATE OF BIRTH: September 13, 1987
DATE OF TRANSFORMATION: September 11, 2006, at age 18

"Isabella Marie"? *digs further* Ah, Marie was her grandmother's name. No mention where "Isabella" came from. I've always wondered, but oh well. In a book where everyone and their dog is named after a grandmother, it's nice to have a name just appear out of nowhere like they so frequently do. The point is that we now have a date! Twilight takes place when Bella is 17, so Twilight takes place in 2005. I triumphantly retain everything said above about Wikipedia and Google and Windows XP service pack 2! (Assuming Bella is using Windows XP.)

Wait. Twilight takes place when Bella is 17, but she's starting the school year after the Christmas break in January. So that means it has to be 2006, not 2005. Are... are Twilight and New Moon and Eclipse and half of Breaking Dawn all covered from January 2006 to September 2006? Nine months? That can't possibly be correct! Hang on. This Twilight Timeline by a fan who I am going to assume is correct has Bella starting school in January 2005 and vampire'd in September 2006. Oh! I see the problem. She's vampire'd at age 18, three days before her birthday. Not three days after. I got the dates mixed up.

Alright, so new we have a date and a timeline! And thanks to this Twilight fan, we even have a date for today. It's March 6th! I hereby declare March 6th to be International Twilight Google Day.

Wait, why does Bella even have a computer of her own? I thought she and Renee were scraping by. Well, let's just say it was their home computer and Renee didn't need it anymore when she went on the road with Phil. Ohmygod, could I be more off topic at this point? I'm sorry. This is the train inside my head and it has animatronic puppets and more stops than the elevator in Charlie's chocolate factory.

   Then I found a promising site -- Vampires A-Z. I waited impatiently for it to load, quickly clicking closed each ad that flashed across the screen. Finally the screen was finished -- simple white background with black text, academic-looking. Two quotes greeted me on the home page:

More ads! We're closing them quickly! My heart is pounding! WHAT BOOTS DO THE ADS ADVERTISE? I really don't know if this Vampire A-Z site exists. It probably exists now, but back in 2005 is anyone's guess. I can almost guarantee that it would have had a black background with red text and possibly some menacing midi music in the background on a forty second loop. But let's get to the quotes!

   Throughout the vast shadowy world of ghosts and demons there is no figure so terrible, no figure so dreaded and abhorred, yet dight with such fearful fascination, as the vampire, who is himself neither ghost nor demon, but yet who partakes the dark natures and possesses the mysterious and terrible qualities of both. -- Rev. Montague Summers

Do you want to know who Reverend Montague Summers is? I did! He sounds like a super-fun guy! He was an eccentric clergyman known for his interest in witches, and he was responsible for the first English translation of the Malleus Maleficarum, which I have a copy of and have in fact read! And just to be clear where his personal feelings were on the matter:

In the introduction to his book on The History of Witchcraft and Demonology (1926) he writes: In the following pages I have endeavoured to show the witch as she really was – an evil liver: a social pest and parasite: the devotee of a loathly and obscene creed: an adept at poisoning, blackmail, and other creeping crimes: a member of a powerful secret organisation inimical to Church and State: a blasphemer in word and deed, swaying the villagers by terror and superstition: a charlatan and a quack sometimes: a bawd: an abortionist: the dark counsellor of lewd court ladies and adulterous gallants: a minister to vice and inconceivable corruption, battening upon the filth and foulest passions of the age.

Doesn't he sound nice? That's a super-fun opinion to have, especially in light of modern studies that may indicate that many people targeted for charges of witchcraft were frequently either (a) marginalized people living off the welfare of others or (b) wealthy widows who attempted to maintain their independence in male-dominated societies. Whatever, he lived in the 1900s and isn't interesting anymore. Moving on to the even better quote!

   If there is in this world a well-attested account, it is that of the vampires. Nothing is lacking: official reports, affidavits of well-known people, of surgeons, of priests, of magistrates; the judicial proof is most complete. And with all that, who is there who believes in vampires? -- Rousseau

OH MY GOD. Rousseau believed in vampires? Well that settles it! (WHAT KIND OF BOOTS DID ROUSSEAU WEAR?)

I actually looked this up, because my first thought on reading this was "no way". With a little sneery face. Only it turns out that Rousseau did write this -- he was just being delightfully satirical when he did. Context! (Not that I expect Bella Swan to know this. But it would have been kind of nice if S. Meyer hadn't included this quote which let-me-tell-you made it really freaking tricky to find the actual context because this baby is slathered on every vampire site in existence at this point.)

Here is what Rousseau actually said, courtesy of a swiffy article by John Morley that is now preserved by Project Gutenberg. Rousseau was apparently mouthing off to an archbishop about the whole doctrine of being damned-for-eternity-for-doing-Pascal's-wager-wrong thing because Rousseau was awesome like that. (Actual French quote appears to be here, but I don't read French. Some of ya'll do, though, so have at it!)

"But is there not then an infinity of facts, even earlier than those of the Christian revelation, which it would be absurd to doubt? By what way other than that of human testimony has our author himself known the Sparta, the Athens, the Rome, whose laws, manners, and heroes he extols with such assurance? How many generations of men between him and the historians who have preserved the memory of these events?"

First, says Rousseau in answer, "it is in the order of things that human circumstances should be attested by human evidence, and they can be attested in no other way. I can only know that Rome and Sparta existed, because contemporaries assure me that they existed. In such a case this intermediate communication is indispensable.

But why is it necessary between God and me? Is it simple or natural that God should have gone in search of Moses to speak to Jean Jacques Rousseau? Second, nobody is obliged to believe that Sparta once existed, and nobody will be devoured by eternal flames for doubting it. Every fact of which we are not witnesses is only established by moral proofs, and moral proofs have various degrees of strength. Will the divine justice hurl me into hell for missing the exact point at which a proof becomes irresistible?

If there is in the world an attested story, it is that of vampires; nothing is wanting for judicial proof -- reports and certificates from notables, surgeons, clergy, magistrates. But who believes in vampires, and shall we all be damned for not believing? Third, my constant experience and that of all men is stronger in reference to prodigies than the testimony of some men."

Oh, Rousseau. I am going to have a philosopher crush on you until someone reminds me that you inevitably did or said something annoyingly privileged at some point in your life, at which point I can go back to simply admiring you for the good and trying not to whitewash away the bad. (At least you didn't try to make your point with pop-up windows!)

Anyway. Those are the two quotes that we get: something from a guy who believed that there was a conspiracy of witches to bring down God's church and a deist who used the ludicrous example of vampires as something that people obviously shouldn't believe in despite the fact that a good many people claim to do precisely that. This is the foundation on which we will rest the existence of the Cullens and yet it seems sort of fitting that the world-building in a book about lying liars who lie be based on a blatant misquote.

   The rest of the site was an alphabetized listing of all the different myths of vampires held throughout the world. The first I clicked on, the Danag, was a Filipino vampire supposedly responsible for planting taro on the islands long ago. The myth continued that the Danag worked with humans for many years, but the partnership ended one day when a woman cut her finger and a Danag sucked her wound, enjoying the taste so much that it drained her body completely of blood.

This passage makes me sad because I wanted to look up the story of the Danag and make a snarky point about more cultures being appropriated for this book, but I can't even find a single reference to "Danag" online that isn't an almost word for word repetition of the above. My GoogleFu has failed me. Can anyone here provide linkage to the Danag and/or comment on how accurate this summary is? I'm genuinely interested.

   I read carefully through the descriptions, looking for anything that sounded familiar, let alone plausible. It seemed that most vampire myths centered around beautiful women as demons and children as victims; they also seemed like constructs created to explain away the high mortality rates for young children, and to give men an excuse for infidelity. Many of the stories involved bodiless spirits and warnings against improper burials. There wasn’t much that sounded like the movies I’d seen, and only a very few, like the Hebrew Estrie and the Polish Upier, who were even preoccupied with drinking blood.

And here is where I'm going to try to rope myself back onto topic and wrap up for the night.

This book makes me so sad sometimes. It really does.

I mean there's the sexism and the ableism and the racism and the cultural appropriation and the unfortunate implications of someone doing everything they can to avoid college, get married, have a baby, and cut off all ties with their family before they reach the dreaded age of nineteen and are suddenly and irrevocably old. All of that is well worth talking about, and I'm not trying to downplay the seriousness of that.

But this book makes me sad sometimes simply and merely because of the lost opportunities. Bella has been established as liking literature and not really being familiar with popular culture. I would expect her research to be more along the lines of digging through the musty Forks library, pulling out classic vampire works, comparing and contrasting what she remembers from Dracula against what she's observed about Edward.

It seems like such a small point, but... it would show her leaving the house! making an effort! being internally consistent as a character! Instead we get this quick Google search after an even quicker info-dump dream which itself followed an info-dump conversation. I know I shouldn't be one to argue with books that are more popular than chocolate, but a series of hasty and immediate info-dumps just seems anti-climatic to me. Bella hasn't had to work for any of this, outside of having to navigate all the pop-up windows.

And then you get this bland telling of Bella's interpretation of these legends, which is filtered through her pseudo-feminism (more on that in a later post!) and marks a complete tonal shift from every other portrayal of her in the novel. "Vampire myths were created to explain away infant mortality rates and also to excuse male infidelity" sounds like a droning book report from a high school student who had the same level of enthusiasm for his assignment as he does for scraping dried gum from the bottom-sides of the desks.

Bella? Should care about this stuff. She's just been told that her life obsession -- her word, not mine -- is a vampire. Then she dreamed it to be true. This stuff matters. Maybe she can't openly take it seriously right now, maybe this is a "ha, ha, let's pretend, you know, just for laughs, just to... um... be thorough!" but for any of the past few pages and all her dire I-just-can't-put-this-off-any-longer build-up to make sense, this should be leaving an impression on her.

And what are we getting? A summary of yet another cultural myth, a vague mention of "movies" with no reference to classic literature whatsoever, a few utterly random quotes, and a pseudo-feminist attempt to thrown out big concepts like male privilege without actually understanding the underlying concept.

And that? Makes me so very sad. Because this? Could have been a lot better, could have packed a lot more action and character development, and could have actually fleshed out some of the ways in which privilege has protected the Cullens and their kind. This whole section could have been a way to show more about Bella, to show more about the world she lives in, to show more about the vampires she interacts with, and to show more about the creature she is destined to become.

But it's not. Because it's just a Google'd info-dump tossed in our lap like a lukewarm soda offered to the thirsty reader. And no amount of pop-ups can make everything I just quoted above interesting or compelling or tense. It's just another book report.

88 comments:

thepsychobabble said...

just a short quick comment today: My mother lives *outside* of a small rural town, and while the rural town was able to get dsl a few years before she was able to, my mom wasn't able to access dsl until 2009 (which would put the town at getting it around 2006-2007, I believe)
She had to make do with dial-up or pay a huge amount for satellite. So. My parents had dial-up until 2009. /endrandom

Ana Mardoll said...

Yeah, that's the problem we're running into right now -- and we're surrounded by a big city on all sides!

jill heather said...

Oh, my father had that popup problem. Viruses. And spyware. And all sorts of shit. Around the same time as Bella, too.

And, yes, Google had by then taken over search and did rankings of results based on location and history -- everyone used Google by then (I know: I worked for search engine companies at the time, not Google, and we only used Google too), and there is no way she just got hundreds of cosmetic company results. They used other things than just where you were located. Wikipedia was around, but I don't remember how important it was then.

Ana Mardoll said...

Viruses. And spyware.

I'm hoping that the Volturi are involved. It would at least make the mentioned-three-times popup ads relevant and exciting and topical and relevant.

jill heather said...

My theory about the spyware is that Stephenie Meyer had this same problem on her computer once and did not realise what it was and/or decided that everyone had dealt with it by just closing popups every 12 seconds. (My father had not more than 1/6 of his browser available for browsing. The rest was ads. Plus popups.)

The Volturi didn't seem like they were into software so much. Although I think it would have been fascinating if they were most excellent programmers and set up malware to attack anyone who searched for infomation on vampires, but then why was there a handy A-Z guide to vampires with actual information that didn't reformat your hard drive and send your location info the the Volturi to be killed?

Ana Mardoll said...

"Vampires are mythical creatures who can only come out in full sunlight, as darkness burns them. Their sharp, pointed teeth are useful for tearing bark of of trees to get to the life-giving sap therein. Please fill out the following form to receive more information on vampires by mail..."

JenL said...

Bella wears boots? As a Texan, I feel obligated to point out here that there are many different kinds of boots. This makes me want to grip the sides of my reader, pull it up to my face, and ask WHAT KIND OF BOOTS ARE YOU WEARING, BELLA? I don't know about Arizona and Washington, but this stuff matters in Texas.

Having grown up in a suburb of Phoenix, a description of boots with jeans makes me automatically assume cowboy boots. But then again, I went away for college (and never went back except one visit) when Bella was 2.

Is he just not interested in the internet? But... he's the chief of police. And I'd like to believe that the chief of police, even in a small town, would be interested enough in the news to get a decent internet connection. Can he maybe not afford one?

Given the calculations on how much money he spent to go visit Bella in California, I'm going with something between "can't afford" and "had better things to do with that money". After all, to the extent he needs it for work, or to stay informed, he can use his work computer.

There's also how little time Charlie spends at the house, even now that Bella is there. And there's no reason to think Charlie used to spend more time at the house before Bella moved in. If he was at home mostly to sleep, shower, and change, no point in spending money on good internet or cable television. (Now, there is a question of why it didn't occur to him that Bella might appreciate cable & internet - but maybe he's still paying off the credit card bills for years of California trips. Or maybe he's saving money for her college fund, or high school graduation present.)

Rakka said...

Of course there's no mention of vampire classics - it would have required Meyer to actually have read of them.

Majromax said...

For those so inclined, the May 1, 2005 Vampire entry on Wikipedia. Entirely free of mention of Twilight, of course.

It does list a couple of Philippine vampire myths, but none have to do with the taro root.

chris the cynic said...

This passage makes me sad because I wanted to look up the story of the Danag and make a snarky point about more cultures being appropriated for this book, but I can't even find a single reference to "Danag" online that isn't an almost word for word repetition of the above. My GoogleFu has failed me. Can anyone here provide linkage to the Danag and/or comment on how accurate this summary is? I'm genuinely interested.

I think this was probably lifted from The Vampire Encyclopedia by Matthew Bunson, published in the year 2000. Google gets a result asDanag A Filipino vampire held to be very ancient as a species, responsible for having planted taro in the islands long ago. The danag worked with humans for many years, but the partnership ended one day when a human cut her finger and a ...

I also see it in Creatures of Philippine lower mythology by Maximo D. Ramos in 1990. Google Result:Intellectual and Spiritual Endowments The Philippine vampire feeds its family when it returns home at night, ... The danag are said to have planted taro "in former days," clearing the fields with their human neighbors.

This is everything I've found which includes only things published at least a month before Twilight.

Dav said...

I am adding "evil liver" to my set of insults, and " the dark counsellor of lewd court ladies" to my aspirations. What, don't lewd ladies deserve some advice and/or therapy?

I'm guessing Bella's wearing stereotypical lumberjack Pacific NW boots - leather, possibly with a stretchy ankle cuff, heavy tread, possibly steel-toed - or hiking boots. Not a bad choice for an ocean trek, assuming she wasn't going to do much on the beach proper. They're too heavy to be fun to walk in on the sand. I also suspect she braided her hair because of what ocean wind does to loose hair, although to be fair, Bella doesn't really seem to normally think that far ahead.

Brin Bellway said...

Throughout the vast shadowy world of ghosts and demons there is no figure so terrible, no figure so dreaded and abhorred, yet dight with such fearful fascination, as the vampire [...] -- Rev. Montague Summers

Do you ever have the feeling you're finally noticing a joke long after everyone else?

Silver Adept said...

If Bella has reasonable amounts of brains, she has hiking boots on. That would give her the most support on her trip and prevent rolled ankles and other such mishaps that she is prone to with her inability to navigate relatively uneven terrain.

I'll second the viruses and malware with the pop-up problem, but even in 2005, there were several free tools one could get to counteract that issue, and virus scanners were not all that expensive. I'm blaming a lack of technical know-how on Bella. Which sets up an interesting problem. If Bella's not bright enough to be able to handle her computer (and the description there is an exaggeration - even on dial-up out in the boonies, it never took more than five minutes to get connected to the local ISP.), then how will she get the information she needs, and furthermore, how will she be able to evaluate its' fitness? We have incoming college freshmen today whose search strategy is "Google it, click the first link, plagarize the info, turn it in."

Oh, right. Bella finds the right page because she has to for the narrative to continue. And we miss a great opportunity for her to meet the public librarian(s, maybe) of Forks and get a crash course in evaluating on-line resources, as well as placing some inter-library loans for her..."research paper". Seriously, for someone who supposedly breezes through her senior classes, Bella has glaring gaps in her technique.

(No, I'm not saying this just because I work in libraries and something like this makes me go CAPSLOCK RAGE. It's a case of the character's lack of research mirroring the author's, and that's a compound fail.)

Anyway, in 2005, Bella having her own computer upstairs is a pretty big trust thing from Charlie. After all, The Internet Is (Still) For Porn (maybe that's where all the malware comes from, and the computer is actually Charlie's), and the big thing then was Chatrooms, where Helpless Children were sucked into all sorts of depravity and staying on-line all the time, tying up the phone lines and running up massive charges from the phone company. Or, maybe it's another symptom of Absentee Charlie.

Waitasec. *rereads* "free service was substandard". Bella has a clue what a decent ISP is like - she must have had some with Renee. Bella should know about all of those issues like pop-ups and malware, then. Or so I assume. Grr. Argh. Faaail. On so many levels, character and author.

chris the cynic said...

Continuing from last time, I've written a bit more of the beginning of Snarky Twilight, this time going through the preface. Which was different because there's no dialog in the original and I've basically been doing it all as dialog. Thus Snarky-Twilight-Bella got her first shot at narration.

-

So I've looked at the timeline and thought about it way more than I should. Mostly I've been noticing the days of the week. We've already noted that a line in New Moon makes the situation entirely impossible. With the days of the week given the closest the length of the year could be to ours is 362, with 369 being the second closest. If the timeline is accurate it is also the case that February 2006 has 31 days in Twilight. There are other discrepancies as well and they fall into a pattern, leading me to speculate that probably a big part of it was Meyer using whatever calendar she had on hand.

2005 dates match 2005, but I'm pretty sure these dates were given well after the text in question was written and I'm not convinced they match the text all that smoothly. I don't know that there are any outright contradictions (I don't think there are) but some things seem off when you apply dates to the text. The first two things that come to mind are pretty small though, those being that the spring dance is in winter and that generally speaking, "The first Tuesday of March," is not how one describes the first day of March even when March 1st happens to be a Tuesday.

The most of rest of the series takes place in 2006 with the dates fitting 2004, 2006, 2007, and 2006 in that order. New Moon fits 2004 dates in chapters four through ten, then the last date listed as coming from chapter ten fits 2006, and that fit will continue throughout New Moon except for the date listed as being from the epilogue (which matches Eclipse.) The Eclipse dates are all based around a 2007 calendar. Then Breaking Dawn returns to a 2006 calendar which, like the 2005 dates, I'm guessing were actually chosen to match the story year.

Redwood Rhiadra said...

I note that these pop-up ads appear *as soon as her computer is turned on*. That is, before she starts her web browser...

That spells virus. Actually, it probably spells *dozens* of viruses.

And I agree with Jill Heather's comment above that this happened to Ms. Meyer, and she never realized her computer was infested with malware. I half-suspect Meyer *still* has dozens of popups appearing every time she boots her computer, and hasn't figured out why... (Yes, there are still people in twenty-fucking-twelve who still open every email attachment, fall for every one of those "let me scan your computer for viruses" websites, etc. - and they NEVER learn, no matter how often support people try to educate them.)

Dav said...

Last time I got one of those viruses, it hijacked my search engine, so every result redirected to the company website to "remove" the virus.

So I imagine Bella clicked on the first link for vampire and got a "Let's scan your computer for vampires" site redirect.

LaylaV said...

I had dial-up in New York City until 2007, because that's what I could afford, and I would routinely make a cup of tea while my computer turned on and logged on. So Bella's getting a bowl of cereal didn't seem like much of a stretch,

Kay0alpha said...

Anyway, in 2005, Bella having her own computer upstairs is a pretty big trust thing from Charlie. After all, The Internet Is (Still) For Porn (maybe that's where all the malware comes from, and the computer is actually Charlie's), and the big thing then was Chatrooms, where Helpless Children were sucked into all sorts of depravity and staying on-line all the time, tying up the phone lines and running up massive charges from the phone company. Or, maybe it's another symptom of Absentee Charlie.

Really? I was born the year Bella was, and I'd had a computer with internet in my room since middle school. I think I might have gotten it earlier than most of my peers, but by the time 2005 rolled around, my situation was fairly common.

chris the cynic said...

I've never had a computer in my room. Well, laptops have been brought in and out of there on occasion. But as for a stationary computer, mine was in the same room as everyone else's computers, the encyclopedias, the printers, the upright piano* and the secondary TV.

I think that there are a lot of different experiences people have had with regard to computers.

-

*The upright piano was and is the only piano we ever had, I simply point out that it was an upright because otherwise one might get the wrong idea.

Kay0alpha said...

I think that there are a lot of different experiences people have had with regard to computers.

Oh, definitely. I just wanted to point out that Bella having a computer in her room isn't necessarily a sign of either great trust or neglect on the part of Charlie.

AcyOS said...

As a fellow Texan, I would just like to say that this BOOTS running gag is funny because it's true. :D

Ana Mardoll said...

Thank you! :D

GeniusLemur said...

Are we really seven chapters in, still without any sign of the love story we're supposedly here to see?

Silver Adept said...

@Kay0alpha -

True, but for the environment that Bella is being raised in, and perhaps of the author's environment, any sort of means by which she could act and chat independently seems worth noticing, especially with how protective of her sexuality Charlie is going to get. Either way, I'm being overbroad again, which appears to be a habit of mine.

@LaylaV

On the dial-up issue as well. But in New York, really? That seems really, really odd.

John Magnum said...

I guess Meyer wanted to show Bella doing academic, factual research on vampires, rather than looking at pop-cultural representations...but she's still looking up mythological stuff. I guess looking at a formal-looking website page (with a doofy name that screams "this is not formal and serious") has more gravitas to it than rewatching Interview with the Vampire or Van Helsing or whatever. I don't know. It's still a deeply weird scene, and I can't help but imagine that a scene at the library (a new set! full of evocative connotations! you get to re-affirm that Bella is a Bookworm!) where she actually looks through encyclopedias or other reference works might be better than friggin' Googling around for the first respectable-looking fansite.

Cupcakedoll said...

Alas, even the doorstop o vampirism doesn't say any more about the danag than that. The info in Twilight is accurate to my book though.

This scene is tragically bland. She should be interested-- This is weird stuff, oh wait, people died young back then, I wonder if the symptoms of vampirism match common diseases of the time and place? She should be scared-- what about the vampires that are just floating heads trailing their intestines behind? What if Ed turns out to be one of THOSE?! She should be skeptical-- who is this Montague Summers guy and why should I believe him? (spoiler: you shouldn't.)

chris the cynic said...

Computer: Greetings, Bella. How are you feeling today?
Bella: I'm fine. How are you?
Computer: Excellent. Shall we play a game?
Bella: No, right now I want you to look up information on vampires.
Computer: Wouldn't you prefer a good game of chess?
Bella: Not today, Joshua.
Computer: Perhaps tomorrow?
Bella: Perhaps. Today I want to know about vampires.
Computer: Google records indicate that there are 401,000 books which include the word "vampire" and 4,510 magazines.
Bella: I figured that would be the case. In the dream vampire boy was glowing, what do you have about glowing vampires?
Computer: Google records include 4,440 books and magazines that contain the words "vampire" and "glow".
Bella: There seem to be a lot of fours involved. Do any of them look interesting?
Computer: The Vampire: A Casebook includes an article titled, “Forensic Pathology and the European Vampire,” which notes that the Greeks distinguished different types of revenants based on characteristics associated with actual dead bodies and two such words appear to be related to glowing. It then cites "The Chemistry of Death" to note that the glowing of dead remains is most often the result of contamination by luminous bacteria.
Bella: That is interesting. Anything else?
Computer: The article also opens with a quote by Rouseau.
Bella: What is the quote?
Computer: “If there is in this world a well-attested account, it is that of the vampires. Nothing is lacking: official reports, affidavits of well-known people, of surgeons, of priests, of magistrates; the judicial proof is most complete. And with all that, who is there who believes in vampires?”
Bella: Well, I believe in vampires, but only because I'm in a book about vampires. In the dream vampire-boy had black eyes, something he has also done on occasion in real life, anything on that?
Computer: Google records include 1,550 books and magazines that include the word “vampire” and the phrase “black eyes” many of the first results are from Anne Rice.
Bella: Ok, let's see. Is there anything else? *thinks for a moment* Are there any records of vampires being referred to as “cold ones”?
Computer: Google records indicate that there are 256 books and magazines containing the word “vampire” and the phrase “cold ones” however, most of those do not appear to actually contain the phrase “cold ones” and some do not even contain the word “vampire”. Of the books that do contain both terms, the term “cold ones” is does not appear to be applied to vampires.
Bella: Anything linking the Quileute people to werewolves?
Computer: Google's top result is Hunter S. Thomson's The Rum Diary. Google is confused.
Bella: [to no one:] Ok, this was all pointless. I'm not even sure why I was supposed to look up things on Google if I was already told, flat out, that the Cullens are vampires. Anyway, I gave it a shot, nothing came of it, I give up. [to the computer:] How about a nice game of chess?

GeniusLemur said...

Yes, there hasn't been much discussion in this thread, and I think you've hit the nail on the head. This whole scene is so dull and dreary and pointless that there just isn't much to talk about.

Still, our heroine has at last done something active of her own initiative. She looked it up on goggle!

Fluffy_goddess said...

I will read through the comments and try to come up with insightful things to say as soon as I've poured myself another cup of tea, but first:

This is hilarious. I know you were irritated when you wrote it, but seriously, this is hilarious -- and now I am thinking about boots, and pop-up ads, and my mom wants to know why I'm laughing at my computer.

Fluffy_goddess said...

(Oh dear god Bella is my age.)

Ahem. Yeah, having a computer in your room by 2005 was not unusual if you were in your late teens. Mattel's attempt at Barbie and Hot Wheels branded computers for kids came in 1999, the 2005-2006 season of Criminal Minds (ctv.ca is currently re-airing selected episodes) shows teenagers having easy access to computers in at least two of the episodes dealing with kids, and so on. It wasn't something you were going to bother with if you were just barely scraping by, but if you only had one kid and you were never home, giving that kid the computer and letting them put it where they wanted could make sense.

Bella really doesn't seem to *like* technology. She seems to be pretty happy driving an ancient truck on the basis that it's sturdy (though I'm a little weirded out that they kept talking about the truck surviving a potential crash -- just because the truck survives, doesn't mean the passengers will; is this another so-long-as-you-don't-make-a-mess aspect of Good Girls Are Expendable?). This is not a computer-friendly interaction, realistic though it might be. She cooks okay, but she's not enthusiastic about it, so I doubt she's secretly lusting after the latest kitchen gadgetry. Is this part of her innate resistance to modern culture?

Which, okay, aligns her nicely with Edward and vampires-as-immortal-remnants-of-earlier-ages, for now. But won't this cause problems down the line? Technology gets more complex -- if she can't even keep up with it now, when it's technology that's literally growing up at the same time she is, is she going to spend the rest of immortality relying on vampires who are more tech-savvy to fake her online footprint?

Silver Adept said...

@Fluffy_Goddess

Hey, that's an interesting point. Is there ever any confirmation that the Cullens do, in fact, use e-mail? Or most other on-line resources? (Right. Alice is a stock trader, but that doesn't mean she does it on-line.) That might sidestep the online presence issue entirely. For everything else, you can use either Jasper or Edward to control the interaction.

Ana Mardoll said...

I am seized with a longing to know why pants would be distasteful.

Cupcakedoll said...

I can imagine a tech-savvy sparklevamp playing MMORPGs for money, since they don't have to sleep he spends all night either beta-testing for the company or making lots of RPGgold and selling it on eBay.

chris the cynic said...

I honestly have no idea why they were. I just know that it was incredibly un-Greek and un-Roman to the point that all they had to do was show someone wearing pants and you can instantly tell that it's a foreigner. (There would be other indications as well, of course.)

I know someone who I might be able to ask, but it'll be a week before she and I are in the same place at the same time.

That said, I think it's just a thing. Like our thing that men don't wear skirts, can you come up with anything approaching a logical reason why that would be the case? It seems to mostly be that it is that way because it is that way. Because we associate that with women and not men, a man doing it is being transgressive. Because pants were a barbarian thing and not a Greek thing, a Greek wearing pants would be extremely transgressive.

When it comes to clothing I think a lot of the answers to, "Why is it a big deal?" questions are simply, "Because it is." Tradition plays a big role in what is acceptable.

Why does American culture freak out in response to exposed breasts in public? It's clearly considered distasteful, but how could you possibly explain why to someone whose culture had no such aversion?

And why are the examples that come to my mind from our culture gender based? I suppose that I could expand "exposed breasts" to "complete nudity" and that would be something not gender based that we consider distasteful that certain other cultures have no problem with.

Thomas Keyton said...

Persians wore them. They were a mark of barbarism.

GeniusLemur said...

That's how a lot of things become distasteful. If it's something that you don't do and the people you dislike do.

chris the cynic said...

Checked out every instance of "e-mail" (the word email does not appear) in the Twilight Saga, there is one that I could not follow up on, but apart from that every instance of email being mentioned was regarding Bella's mother except for Angela asking, "Will you email me?" when Bella was planning to do no such thing. So they don't appear to email.

That said, I don't think we can swear off them using technology too much. Beyond the cars, consider medicine.

There is one instance of the abbreviation DNA being brought up. It seems to be brought up by Carlisle, but I can't actually check the page in question. What is clear is that Carlise personally took a look at Jacob's DNA and discovered that Jacob has more chromosome pairs than that the ordinary human being. Nucleic acid (the NA in DNA and RNA) wasn't even discovered until the second half of the 19th century, at which point Carlisle would have been more than 200 years old. He, at least, seems to keep up with new technology.

He doesn't use the term chromosome though. No, that is limited to Bella who only uses it when talking about the Y-chromosome. When boys are talking bike she says, "Many of the words were unfamiliar to me, I figured I'd have to have a Y-chromosome to really understand the excitement," and a book later, "The urge to fight must be a defining characteristic of the Y-chromosome." So... that's classy.

Trying to figure out what books those were from* (New Moon and Eclipse respectively) caused me to bump into Seduced by Twilight, a book Ana recently mentioned, which concludes the section that excerpts those quotes thus: "Presenting masculinity as chromosomal destiny, the saga suggests that changing the norms of masculinity is fruitless -- that patriarchy is here to stay." A paragraph earlier it comments on how Charlie's parenting, including his policing of Bella's sexuality, is "presented as normal and benign. In fact, what some might see as negligent fathering is presented in a positive light..."

It looks like a good book, inasmuch as such a judgement can be made from reading two paragraphs of it. It is certainly aware of Twilight's role in reinforcing patriarchal values. That said, you can only judge a book so much from reading two paragraphs.

Back to Twilight itself, the use of the word genetic is just as useless as the use of the world chromosomes when it comes to telling about Carlise's adaptation to modern technology**, but I think the fact that he's running genetic tests on werewolves in his spare time is pretty solid evidence that the Cullens are capable of keeping pace with changing tech.

-

* It is possible to search the entire Twilight Saga using google books, but there are limitations. One is that since you're not getting a book for free (which would, amoung other things, be illegal) sometimes you only find that a word was used, but you can't look to see its context. Another is that a maximum of 100 results will be shown. And the one that comes up in this case is that it doesn't tell you what book the results come from. You just know that each result is from one of the books within the saga.

** Three instances are used. Edward talking about werewolves in the course of saying that Bella is such a force of negativity in the universe that she could function as a weapon of mass destruction if only her negative influence could be harnessed. Leah saying that she [Leah] is a genetic dead end. Edward talking about the werewolves in order to say that they're not really werewolves but instead shapeshifters that everyone calls werewolves.

Rikalous said...

As a (physician? surgeon? I can't remember) , Carlisle would have to be good at keeping up with the times. You can get away with, say, running a flower shop with fairly Luddite attitude, but medicine isn't a field that's standing still. I'm fairly certain that even human doctors need to put in some effort to keep up-to-date.

kitryan said...

I was taught (though I have no documented references at hand) in costume history class, that Greeks (of the ancient variety) disliked the notion of cutting cloth into shapes, as it was messing with the integrity of the woven piece, so, despite being technologically able to cut and sew more complex garments, they chose to work with whole pieces- creating chitons and other garments that were pinned, folded, and gathered, but not cut.

Fluffy_goddess said...

Oh, I'm pretty sure *some* vampires adapt just fine -- after all, the vampires turned three millenia ago who weren't good at adapting were probably killed off two-and-a-half millenia ago. (Though there's something odd in putting their Super Secret Evil City in Tuscany. It's like... okay, you've moved on out of Mesopotamia, that's good, but you're stuck a bit in the Renaissance, do you need WD-40? But I have a snarky distaste of setting Secret Headquarters in Italy, because dear god the place is tiny, there isn't room for all the secret societies people imagine are there. At least it isn't Rome. Usually it's Rome.) But Edward certainly still acts like a throwback to an earlier time, and Bella comes off as though she'd like to.

Then again, this is about attitudes. It's perfectly plausible that Bella would survive past her first millenia using ever more new technology, all the while hating technology and longing to wander about in a pretty regency gown and gaze longingly at things. Whereas Carlisle will be pestering her to at least join facebook and play farmville with Esme, because you're barely *real* if you don't have a facebook page.

(I have, actually, been accused of being a made-up person and/or in witness protection by people who can't find me on facebook. If you have no digital history, or the wrong kind, it kind of sends up huge red flags.)

chris the cynic said...

Their name (Volturi) means "vultures" in Latin. Their town, Volterra, looks vaguely similar (though it seems to have entirely unrelated roots*) and may have been chosen for that reason. It could be that they were looking around and thinking, "Where should we roost, vultures that we are? It's a shame there's no town named "vulture". Well, Volterra is somewhat similar, we could go there, I suppose."

That said, if they were going for similarity you'd think they'd have moved into Castel Volturno on the Volturno river. Then you get the "u" in there.

Anyway, a group that calls themselves the vultures is pretty far into land of evil to the exclusion of reason.

"What do you call yourselves?"
"We are the vulching vultures who vulch. But in Latin."
"And you probably have your secret base in Italy, right?"
"Yup!"
"And your laws are Draconian?"
"Indeed."

Is there any particular reason they're called vultures, by the way?

-

* Volterra was previously called Volaterrae and before that Velathri.

Dav said...

I dunno, if I were going to pick a secret base, gelatto would be high on my list of "pros" for a location. It might even be worth splitting a secret building with another up-and-coming secret group. The Florid Flowers of Florence, perhaps. (Those rose gardeners are hardcore evil, though - might be above my grade.) The Luminous Illiminati of Lucca? The Carping Carp of Carpi? It would take some coordination, but I bet we could find a schedule that worked for us. It would be necessary anyway - have you *seen* what real estate is in cities where ex-pats want to go live? And sharing with an evil group would mean not having to explain your exorbitant utility bills.

Maybe I'd think about Italy after I worked out the matte UV-blocking body paint, though.

Realistically, where would you be best off having a secret lair? Volcanoes are great, but the complications are extreme. The big western states with the most states are also the ones where running up a huge electricity and water bill are going to raise eyebrows. ("No, really, Officer, I'm not growing pot, I'm just trying to create monkey-pony hybrids!") All kinds of infrastructure problems on remote tropical islands. No wonder so many evil groups set up corporations these days - it really makes things easier.

Does anyone know if Carlisle ran the tests himself? That would be fairly unusual tech for most clinics, and I think even for small hospitals - it would be cheaper to send stuff to Seattle, which is pretty risky. Patient confidentiality is one thing, but a chromosomal mutation that hasn't been named before would raise some alerts. *Especially* if they find out that Jacob doesn't show any of the typical problems associated with chromosomal differences. *Especially* if they find out that his "extra" chromosomes don't appear to map to any of the human ones.

Also, the chromosomal thing means semi to full sterility if werewolves try to have kids with people. And I'm not even going to touch the gigantic FAIL of having a Native American tribe that isn't really part of the human species at all . . .

Guest said...

"No, really, Officer, I'm not growing pot, I'm just trying to create monkey-pony hybrids!"

Just makes me think of the "half-pony half-monkey monster" from Jonathan Coulton's "Skullcrusher Mountain." (Warning if you look it up: involves dubious coercive consent issues.)

hapax said...

It might even be worth splitting a secret building with another up-and-coming secret group. The Florid Flowers of Florence, perhaps. (Those rose gardeners are hardcore evil, though - might be above my grade.) The Luminous Illiminati of Lucca? The Carping Carp of Carpi?

The Venetian Blind, of course!

Really, from my experience, the best place for a Secret Headquarters of Secrecy would be any very large city, in the middle-class professional district. When we lived cheek by jowl with millions upon millions of other very busy people in New York and Cincinnati, we were practically desperate not to know our neighbors -- when we were at home, we just wanted to be LEFT ALONE.

Dav said...

Best Nice Guy song *ever*.

Dav said...

Ha! Yeah, although you have to be careful where you end up - some of those homeowners associations would have your secret lair all figured out and fined within minutes.

Will Wildman said...

I note that these pop-up ads appear *as soon as her computer is turned on*. That is, before she starts her web browser...

Well, no, not in the way that I recall dial-up working. Here's the stuff Ana quoted:

My modem was sadly outdated, my free service substandard; just dialing up took so long that I decided to go get myself a bowl of cereal while I waited. [...] With another sigh, I turned to my computer. Naturally, the screen was covered in pop-up ads.

-which reads to me as 'start up computer, start up browser, loooooong dialing process during which Bella fetches cereal, POPUPS'. I question the way she apparently gets popups the instant her browser connects to the internet (what's her home page?), but unless there's a version of modem I'm not familiar with wherein it's normal to dial-up before the computer has finished booting, I think the order of operations is okay.

---

As a (physician? surgeon? I can't remember) , Carlisle would have to be good at keeping up with the times.

I kind of assumed that Carlisle was a Doctor of Doctoring, the way fictional doctors tend to be, but now I'm curious, since Twilight has such a wealth of thorough (if not meticulous or consistent) background data. Do we ever learn what his specialty is? Does he have more than one? (Edward, if I recall, is also A Doctor, several times over; did he ever specialise?) Does he ever forget what century he's in and start trying to think up an excuse for doing a ligature instead of cauterising with tar without rousing suspicion? My brain hungers for anything that is not a stream-of-google depiction of web browsing.

---

Really, from my experience, the best place for a Secret Headquarters of Secrecy would be any very large city, in the middle-class professional district.

I think this ALL THE TIME. Also, generic office towers. I work in the corner of downtown and there are vast shiny window-walled buildings nearby where I like to imagine people are secretly building huge mecha and suchlike, because it's not like anyone ever really asks what's inside these gigantic buildings. It's a giant shiny building downtown! That's where giant windowy buildings live! Why should they have to justify their existence to anyone else?

I would also probably name it something like RightWerx and hire a really inept graphical designer to splash together some atrocious pamphlets to disguise our lack of actual function as a lack of internal direction. Are we a human rights organisation? An employment agency? A rehabilitation non-profit? Are we religiously-flavoured? Does anyone actually care, given that we obviously have no budget, organisational talent, or relevance in our field of whatever-it-happens-to-be? No. No they don't.

And that is how we rule the world without anyone bothering us.

bekabot said...

About vampires adapting...I think it may be possible that new-born vampires have a pretty high non-survival rate. That seems to be the stated case in most vampire lore and something like it is pretty heavily implied in the Twilight series. Think of all those new-borns Victoria creates in Eclipse and of brief their post-life lifespans are. ("The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner...") In the middle of Eclipse Jasper delivers a big-deal explanation connected with this issue, and at the beginning of it (the book, not the explanation) Edward tells Bella that a newborn vampire is probably behind the bloodshed in Seattle. (He's right about the source of the problem but doesn't yet realize that he's dealing with plural creatures and not a singular creature.) When Edward delivers his warning to Bella he sounds comparatively blasé; he's all: "We've seen this problem before loads of times so you can take our word for it that it is what we say it is; if only you weren't in potential danger we wouldn't give it a thought because we Cullens are so aww-sum that we would eat new-borns for breakfast were it not for the fact that we gave them up at about the time we swore off humans." That's not exactly what Edward says but he speaks in that key. Bella responds the way she usually does; she is subdued. Later on, events bear Edward out.

So it looks as though, under certain circumstances at any rate, vampires reproduce the way a lower life form does. They don't have only a few offspring upon whom they bestow great care; they can spawn in great numbers and sometimes do that, understanding all the while that only a few of their brood will make it to whatever counts with vampires as "maturity". So that vampires get put through a strong form of selection from the get-go. The ones who don't perish might be understood to be the more adaptable; I mean, how adaptable would you not have to be to learn to move around in a superhardened body wracked with exquisite bloodthirst and to experience things via amped-up senses, etc., etc.? And to learn to do it fast? And in the meantime to make no mistakes which might give you and you companions and/or maker away? And that's just for starters...because the Darwinian sieve would continue to operate as long as a vampire continues to exist. The vampires who can go with the flow are the ones who are not borne down by the years. As for the others, the ones who areborne down, well, they fall by the wayside and the world hears no more of them. No doubt vampires deal with challenges which do not assail humans; they (vampires) are inclined to remain changeless but they must learn to change to some extent b/c time does not stand still, even though their bodies do. All in all, quite the predicament.

bekabot said...

Awwwwk. Sorry about the typos. Readable version:

About vampires adapting...I think it may be possible that new-born vampires have a pretty high non-survival rate. That seems to be the stated case in most vampire lore and something like it is pretty heavily implied in the Twilight series. Think of all those new-borns Victoria creates in Eclipse and of brief their post-life lifespans are. ("The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner...") In the middle of Eclipse Jasper delivers a big-deal explanation connected with this issue, and at the beginning of it (the book, not the explanation) Edward tells Bella that a newborn vampire is probably behind the bloodshed in Seattle. (He's right about the source of the problem but doesn't yet realize that he's dealing with plural creatures and not a singular creature.) When Edward delivers his warning to Bella he sounds comparatively blasé; he's all: "We've seen this problem before loads of times so you can take our word for it that it is what we say it is; if only you weren't in potential danger we wouldn't give it a thought because we Cullens are so aww-sum that we would eat new-borns for breakfast were it not for the fact that we gave them up at about the time we swore off humans." That's not exactly what Edward says but he speaks in that key. Bella responds the way she usually does; she is subdued. Later on, events bear Edward out.

So it looks as though, under certain circumstances at any rate, vampires reproduce the way a lower life form does. They don't have only a few offspring upon whom they bestow great care; they can spawn in great numbers and sometimes do, understanding all the while that only a few of their brood will make it to whatever counts with vampires as "maturity". So that vampires get put through a strong form of selection from the get-go. The ones who don't perish might be understood to be the more adaptable; I mean, how adaptable would you not have to be to learn to move around in a superhardened body wracked with exquisite bloodthirst and to experience things via amped-up senses, etc., etc.? And to learn to do it fast? And in the meantime to make no mistakes which might give you and you companions and/or maker away? And that's just for starters...because the Darwinian sieve would continue to operate as long as a vampire continues to exist. The vampires who can go with the flow are the ones who are not borne down by the years. As for the others, the ones who are borne down, well, they fall by the wayside and the world hears no more of them. No doubt vampires deal with challenges which do not assail humans; they (vampires) are inclined to remain changeless but they must learn to change to some extent b/c time does not stand still, even though their bodies do. All in all, quite the predicament.

Gaaaaaaahh. [hyperventilates briefly]

bekabot said...

Tried to fix typos, to no avail. So: read comment above if you can. Meanwhile, deep apologies.

chris the cynic said...

Seemed perfectly readable to me.

thepsychobabble said...

My MIL actually paid $40 because a pop up told her that her computer was riddled with viruses, according to their free scan. And she needed to pay up to rid her computer of viruses.
This woman owned two business and raised three children with absentee fathers....and couldn't see this as possibly being a scam.

Silver Adept said...

Re: Adaptable vampires -

Makes sense that Carlisle would have to know those kinds of things to keep his medical license current. Does kind of make me wonder if the Cullens deliberately choose small towns where Carlisle can basically become the town doctor - allows him to do cleanup if one of the kids hurts someone accidentally (or goes off the rails), lets him keep an eye or a finger on the pulse of the town, keeps his technology requirements slightly behind cutting-edge...and allows him to play in the Masquerade as the responsible adult who does responsibly adult things. Unlike the kids, who have to go to school. Repeatedly.

Which makes you think that Carlisle would probably prefer to vampire people around 30 years of their human age, instead of having to deal with crisis situations like pregnancies and people dying if they don't get vampired. Might help them be able to control some of those newborn urges, and hopefully avoid (or at least get a leg up) on the pressures of being a new vampire and not getting yourself killed.

Re: Hiding the Evil Lair in Plain Sight

Tokyo-3. And Gendo, who wants to become the Uber-Pimp by playing "1999" in the 2000s. (That's a fandub joke, not an Evangelion one) But mostly the fact that you can hide just about anything in the maze of steel and glass that is the commercial buildings and skyscrapers. And you have less of those pesky zoning issues and nosy neighbors and police investigations. Which, I think, is why the biggest evil in The Incredibles is not Syndrome, but the insurance company at the beginning of the movie.

Winter Seale said...

First, I take issue with Silver Adept's characterization of Bella as "not bright enough" on the basis of her not having cleaned up her adware. I've seen many demonstrably very smart people in the same situation. Doctors and teachers, first among them. =p Just because they in theory *could* learn enough about the computer to fix the problem, doesn't mean they find learning about the computer remotely interesting, nor do they find the closing the ads sufficiently irritating to actually bother.

Just to echo what other's have said... back in 2005 I was still one of the owners of a small ISP in rural Maine...

Dialup was still very common in small rural towns, and Forks definitely qualifies as both. While we had various high speed options, the largest number of our customers were still on dialup even in 2005. There are actually still many areas that can only get online via dialup and satellite, for various arcane technical and bureaucratic reasons.

While Windows XP Service Pack 2 may have been out, in my experience many, MANY people don't do updates, ever. So I think it's actually quite unlikely that this machine has it. In fact, it could easily have been running something like Windows ME (released in 2001). But as you say, all the pop-ups don't sound like a browser thing. They do sound like a lot of our customer's machines around that time, however. They would install little software widgets, like weather notifiers, that would bundle with them horrible browser toolbars or other programs that produced the pop-up ads.

Lliira said...

Yep, dial-up is still the only option for lots of people in many small rural towns. I know this because a couple people in my World of Warcraft guild were stuck on bad dial-up connections because they had no other options.

Anyway, on Rousseau: he thought men were more independent and stronger than women, and that they were only attached to women by sexual desire. He thought women, in contrast, both desired and needed men. He thought woman's place was as a submissive baby-maker for man. He feared that if women were allowed to act in the public sphere, and not constantly ashamed of their own sexuality, men would become subservient to them. The subordinate place of women was absolutely central to his philosophy of how the world "should" be.

Ana Mardoll said...

*sigh* I knew there'd be SOMETHING. You just can't find super-feminist dead white philosopher guys, it seems.

Why can't we have nice things?

chris the cynic said...

If you could find people from long ago who were all good, wouldn't that mean that progress had ground to a halt since then?

Though on the subject of progress, something I saw in the paper bothered me. Describing the hunger games it said that the book series "features a strong female character." I assume that that's true but misleading because if it weren't misleading I'd think you or Will or someone else would have said something, but misleading or not the newspaper thought that that was the way to say it and saying it was worthy of note. And I thought to myself something along the lines of:

A strong female character? A strong female character? The ancient Greeks were one of the most misogynistic cultures in history and they had plenty of stories with a strong female character. We've had two thousand years and a few centuries to try and improve and we're still at the point where you talk about something by saying it "features a strong female character" as if that's something worthy of note and praise?

I'm guessing that The Hunger Games actually features strong female characters.

Ana Mardoll said...

I love that explanation re: progress. :D

Re: The Hunger Games

I mentioned in the Rambles widget that Husband and I saw the movie this weekend. And... you have to understand: I love that book trilogy more than I love anything else. I love, love, love The Hunger Games. And I loved, loved, loved the movie. It's not for everyone, but it was perfect for me.

I'm still trying to figure out how and what to say about it, but there's a great thread on it on Shakesville. :)

That review... they probably meant Strong Female MAIN Character, because yes there are strong women throughout. But my second-favorite (second to Katniss) -- Joanna -- doesn't show up until later. But I love her so.

I keep meaning to host a THG deconstruction here when Real Life lets me. I'm not sure how interesting it will be, though, since every post will be me talking about how DEEP! MEANINGFUL! PERFECT! RESONATING! each chapter is. :P

chris the cynic said...

I keep meaning to host a THG deconstruction here when Real Life lets me. I'm not sure how interesting it will be, though, since every post will be me talking about how DEEP! MEANINGFUL! PERFECT! RESONATING! each chapter is. :P

Well if you sprinkle in the occasional, "The translation could use some work," that's sort of what I've been doing with .hack//Sign.

-

And in other news, I made a .hack//Sign index (which feels like it took forever and definitely did take an objectively long time) in the course of writing this post so that I'd have something to link to. Though I was actually planning on making one eventually anyway.

Will Wildman said...

That review... they probably meant Strong Female MAIN Character, because yes there are strong women throughout. But my second-favorite (second to Katniss) -- Joanna -- doesn't show up until later. But I love her so.

'Main' does specify things a bit more, but even then I think chris's point stands - it still seems quite common to act as though having a well-written (i.e., acts like a person) female character is an unprecedented advance in literary concepts. Plus, y'know, the more we pretend that having just one around is impressive, the easier it is to act like the active marginalisation of female characters is just the normal way things are.

I don't think it's coincidental that a series which does so well on strong women also supplies such fantastic male characters, either. Because: Cinna! Finnick! I WISH TO SUBSCRIBE TO YOUR NEWSLETTERS!

Rikalous said...

Unless you try to make the case that an instantaneous, almost irresistible desire to tear someone's throat out at the sight/scent of their blood is either (a) not a medical condition, or (b) not an impairment or limitation on medical practice, Carlisle would have to deliberately lie on this question to get the license and if ever caught, would be hauled up for an administrative hearing at the very least, just for falsification. According to TVTropes, Carlisle's super compassion powers and 200 years of practice have rendered him immune to the smell of blood.

Silver Adept said...

@Gelliebean -

Oooh, neat! Isn't it wonderful what you find out when you actually do the research?

There's a quick way around the problem if you don't want to go the Because Jasper route (which does work, of course) - borrowing from David Eddings and his long-lived sorceress Polgara - just increment the Roman numeral after the name. So there's the possibility that anyone looking into the records would find that this Carlisle Cullen went to medical school, like his father, Carlisle Cullen, and his grandfather, Carlisle Cullen, and his great-grandfather, Carlisle Cullen, and really, since the various Carlisles Cullen don't live anywhere near each other, it's just a family resemblance. An eerie, eerie, family resemblance, but just a family resemblance. Pay no attention to the fact that his kids look nothing like him, they're all adopted, anyway.

*sigh* Another piece of worldbuilding missed on. Because, after all, Carlisle would have some advice to the newly created vampires on how to live a regular "vegetarian" life and avoid upsetting the Volturi.


Elsewhere, further apologies for assumptions about the geekiness of the culture in 2005/2006.

And for the Hunger Games, if that's the case, then we'll have to figure out a way of getting the books so we can read along. And then ahead.

Anton_Mates said...

Realistically, where would you be best off having a secret lair? Volcanoes are great, but the complications are extreme. The big western states with the most states are also the ones where running up a huge electricity and water bill are going to raise eyebrows

Well, the logistical calculus ought to be different for a bunch of superspeedy indestructible people who are excellent swimmers and don't need to breathe. What do the Volturi need with a big electricity and water bill? They could have their headquarters down an abandoned, poison-gas-filled mineshaft. Or underwater. Or in Antarctica. Or underwater in an abandoned, poison-gas-filled mineshaft dug out of the side of Mt. Erebus in Antarctica. They'd have to feed mostly on scientists and tour groups, but apparently they manage to get away with that anyway. I guess they could blame the penguins.

Having their secret lair in a bustling human town makes no damn sense, is all I'm saying.

Anton_Mates said...

My first thought is to wonder why Charlie doesn't have a decent internet service provider. But that sounds awfully privileged! Is there not one physically available to his home in Forks?

The real Forks is a lot more run-down than the Twilight version--judging by the movies, at least--but it's not exactly wilderness. They've got Comcast, Qwest, and a couple of local ISPs for the northwest Olympic peninsula, all offering DSL and cable. There's no way Charlie should be on dialup.

In fact, don't we know that Charlie watches ESPN all the time? Why would the Swans have free dialup if they've got cable TV? Their provider's probably begging them to get a discount internet package.

More evidence for the "Charlie Swan does everything in his power to avoid non-job-mandated contact with the outside world" theory, I suppose.

Because it's just a Google'd info-dump tossed in our lap like a lukewarm soda offered to the thirsty reader.

And it's an info-dump that's completely counterproductive for foreshadowing or plot advancements. If you're writing a story with the big reveal that a mythical creature actually exists, you want to lead with a few hints that there might be something to the myth. Okay, maybe most vampire stories are still bullshit, and Bella can point that out to show what a smart person and a reliable narrator she is. But she should also be picking up intriguing hints of the vampires that actually exist in her world.

Maybe there are various historical accounts of living statues that attacked people and drank their blood in broad daylight--accounts that are eerily similar, despite being centuries or continents apart--but they never gained credibility because they didn't match the local vampire myths closely enough. Maybe several of those accounts came from drunks and beggars in northern Italy, but those suddenly stopped appearing a couple centuries ago, when the Volturi got serious about secrecy. Something like that.

Instead, Bella basically discovers that there have been vampire stories in all places and times, and that there have also been actual vampires in all places and times, and that these two facts have pretty much nothing to do with each other. People are constantly making up tales of bloodsucking corpses to explain infant mortality while actual bloodsucking corpses are running around unnoticed. It's just a giant coincidence. How could that be satisfying to a reader?

chris the cynic said...

Reading this, I wonder if it has to do with the flood myth. Meyer's use of the Quileute flood myth as a datapoint in favor of Noah is part of a long tradition of going around the world, finding every myth with a flood in it, and saying that even though most of them are completely different they all refer to the same thing and thus, by their existence, mean the thing must be real.

Meyer is doing the same thing with vampires. The myths are varied to the point of complete incompatibility, just like the flood myths, so clearly they all refer to the same thing. They're just less correct variations on our version.

Bella's process is to hit upon the possibility of vampires, discover that there are vampire myths all over the world, consider rational explanations as to why, throw out those rational explanations in favor of faith, and stick with the story she was originally told. That's more or less how you're expected to react to the flood myth argument.

Ana Mardoll said...

THIS.

And that really does sum up Bella's almost anti-intellectual approach: she essentially tells Edward "I don't know what you are and I don't care".

Which... is sweet in a romance novel, I guess? But if this were any other genre, this would be the point at which Bella is turned into a vampire bride and forced to hunt and hurt her best friend, who is now the real protagonist.

Gelliebean said...

"According to TVTropes, Carlisle's super compassion powers and 200 years of practice have rendered him immune to the smell of blood."

Aw, shucks. I think I may have known that in passing at some point.... Thanks for catching it.

Ana Mardoll said...

Oh how I love this comment, partly because the masquerade stuff is so frustrating for me. I mean, they're using the SAME NAMES everywhere, best we can tell. Why, why, why. And they're the least conspicuous people ever.

The bit about the photo is also well taken. I'm also guessing that vampires can't change their hair length or facial hair, since they're sort of frozen in time. So there's NOTHING Carlisle can do to look different over the years, except maybe via wigs and makeup. Which they never mention.

And even if Carlisle is immune to blood lust, that hasn't stopped him from turning at least two of his patients into beings that Edward seriously regrets becoming. Not a picture of responsibility.

Ana Mardoll said...

I feel your pain. Indexes take forever. :D

Gelliebean said...

Something else I've been pondering as an off-shoot of the "Carlisle repeats med school for eternity" thing - how serendipitous is it for Bella that she just happens to fall right into the time where Sparkleboi is passing for the same age as her? Since the Cullens' stated reason for repeating high school is so that they can stay in the same place as long as possible, they probably didn't start him off in his junior year; added to that is the fact that they're already well established in Forks as Persons of Note, which usually takes a while.... In fact, on a tangent to the tangent, my experience in small towns (all one of them) is that you can't just pop into town and become that respected and renowned; you have to grow up there and know other families who went to school with your parents and went cow-tipping with your uncles and still remember your grandmother's lemon pie recipes.

So scenario 1 I'm imagining is Bella moving to Forks at the very beginning of the whole cycle, when Sparkleboi is trying to pass as a mature-for-his-age freshman. It's still plausible that they would encounter each other - either she's making up courses required in WA that weren't in the curriculum in AZ, or they pass each other going into/out of the cafeteria when a gust of wind catches the door and blows her scent his way. He's still 104 years old, chronologically, but now he's functioning in society as 15 when she's 17....

Scenario 2 would be that Bella arrives in Forks after the Cullens have been there for quite a while, and are getting ready to move on.... What do you think the statute of limitations is on their usual stay in any one place before people start getting suspicious about their appearances? 10 years? 15? So the Cullens are now completely established as that incredibly insular family that never interacts with anyone if they can help it, never comes to the street fair or the fireworks, never socializes (can't you just imagine the curtained windows with eyes peering out? Or the kids daring each other to run up and touch the porch before getting caught?) and Sparkleboi is passing as a very well-preserved 28 or so to Bella's 17. Again, same chronological age of 104, same cuddly personality, but now he presents himself as 11 years older than she is.

In either of these scenarios compared to the text, nothing important about anything has actually changed; the only difference is how it looks to the citizens of Forks. In either case, would *readers* be so accepting of the relationship? Would they still think that stalking, kidnapping, and emotional abuse were romantic/charming/true love in action?

Would Bella still be so driven to pursue a relationship with her one-true-forever-love if he seemed to be 2-3 years younger, or 10-15 years older?

Ana Mardoll said...

I think this is a very profound point, and I'd like to mentally explore it more, if only because it's an interesting counterpoint to the BUT YOU MUST TURN ME NOW "tension" of Bella growing "older" than Edward. If he can pass as a twenty-something, there's no real reason not to upgrade his age.

(I mean, yes, it's a masquerade reason, but they never really struggle in that area, so it doesn't matter.)

And I do think that 17!Bella and 25!Edward would be a different story. Well... not for me, but I would think for the readership.

Timothy (TRiG) said...

And I want to see the version where Edward is passing for 15. That could be interesting.

TRiG.

Anton_Mates said...

Meyer's use of the Quileute flood myth as a datapoint in favor of Noah is part of a long tradition of going around the world, finding every myth with a flood in it, and saying that even though most of them are completely different they all refer to the same thing and thus, by their existence, mean the thing must be real.

The difference is, though, that Flood proponents don't usually say the "most of them are completely different" part, nor do they admit that there are excellent alternative reasons why people would come up with flood myths. They're smart enough to understand that such facts would argue against the story being based on historical fact.

I mean, take this page on flood legends by some random young-earth creationist who's nonetheless a better writer than Stephenie Meyer. It hammers on the obvious talking points. Isn't it amazing that all these stories from around the world are exactly like the Biblical account? Isn't it amazing that so many of them come from isolated tribes and exotic peoples who could never have encountered an Abrahamic religion in the past? Neither of these claims is particularly true, of course, but our creationist does realize that they should be true if the Flood hypothesis is correct.

Ditto for von Daniken and his ancient astronauts, or the people arguing for the reality of Atlantis/Bigfoot/alien abductions. All of them make the same sort of argument: "There are lots of stories like this around the world, and they're all incredibly similar, and there's no reason why people should keep making up this particular story if it didn't actually happen." But Meyer somehow manages to get this 180° wrong. "There are lots of vampire stories around the world and they're totally different from each other and there are all these reasons why people would make them up. Also, vampires are real."

Ana Mardoll said...

I do think there's a correlation. In both cases, Meyer is taking dissimilar myths (flood, vampires), discarding the differences (canoes versus ark, for example), highlighting the similarities (water! blood!), and essentially *asserting* the legends all refer to the same thing...

Ana Mardoll said...

Ha. Then he'd be younger than Jacob and utterly unsuitable to Bella.

chris the cynic said...

Edward (15) and Isabella (17) are having a discussion about politics, and by discussion I basically mean that that they're finding out that they agree a lot by blurting out whatever comes to mind. Edward brings a lot more historical information to the discussion, he knows when birth control became a partisan issue, he has his own favorite period in the history of the tax code (the 1950s when the top marginal rate was more than 90%) and he can cite from memory the dates that various programs he lies started/expanded/atrophied. Isabella has less information, but is more passionate about it, she has optimism and hope and the drive to act. Unlike Edward, she's the one who might actually do something about all this.

Edward tells a joke, which is hilarious and I'm not going to write because I can't think of anything even moderately funny at the moment. Isabella laughs a bit too loud, a bit too long, and is lost in the moment. When the moment passes she abruptly pulls back, her posture changes, and she pulls herself back where she had been leaning forward.

"Is something wrong, Isa?"

"You know, Ed... sometimes I forget how old you are."

Edward becomes preoccupied with his fingernails, "Yeah... about that...."

Anton_Mates said...

But--as I'm reading it, anyway, and feel free to correct me--she's *not* asserting that they all refer to the same thing. She's making the opposite claim: that most vampire myths aren't about the "real" vampires at all, but about a bunch of different creatures (bodiless, not blood-drinkers, etc.) that were made up to explain infant deaths and such. The only people in the world who managed to record stories about the real vampires are the Quileute, apparently.

Bella *should* be discovering that vampire legends all refer to the same thing. They don't in reality, of course, but Meyer would be justified in massaging the history of her fictional universe to make it look that way. Instead, Bella's big conclusion in this section is apparently that vampire legends are all rubbish.

chris the cynic said...

I think Bella's journey through it is more what someone who had gone through as the one being preached to would experience it, rather than the one doing the preaching.

She hears a story, she find out that such stories exist all over the world, she has initial doubts based on how varied the stories are, she finds a handful of stories that do seem to match (these ones are beautiful and pale skinned, these ones are super fast, this legend is specifically about Carlisle) she gets frustrated because nothing matches 100%, and then eventually she comes back to the legend she started with based on faith.

Or to put it another way, I think you're seeing both sides of the conversation:

Preacher: Noah.
Bella is unconvinced.
Preacher: But there are all of these flood stories all over the world.
Bella: But they don't match, and I can come up with an explanation for them that doesn't involve a worldwide flood.
Preacher: Ok, but look at all these similarities between this specific myth and Noah.
Bella: Ok, yeah, all right. But... why doesn't it just say Noah? And if they're all from the same myth why are there not even more similarities. Shouldn't at least some of the myths match almost exactly?
Preacher: Well-
*Bella walks out*
But, though she has left the preacher her mind cannot leave what she has learned and finally, later on, this happens:
Bella: Preacher was right all along: Noah.

If you go to a site that makes the argument you only get the preacher bits:
Preacher: Noah.
Preacher: But there are all of these flood stories all over the world.
Preacher: Ok, but look at all these similarities between this specific myth and Noah.

Bella's version seems to be much more what we'd expect from a convert.

Susan B. said...

I must confess I kind of like the idea that, even with the presence of real vampires in the world, independent vampire myths still arose. Even if vampires are real, that doesn't mean people won't make up stories about blood-sucking monsters and so on, because people are just people. (Of course, the myths might be reinforced by the few genuine encounters with vampires that actually happen.)

This touches on an idea I've had for a while--in many fantasy stories involving characters from "our" world, as soon as the protagonist figures out that magic/vampires/Greek gods/Cthulhu exist, they begin to accept without question any new information they hear about monsters/magic/gods etc, regardless of the source or whether they have any evidence for it. Buffy Summers learns she's the Slayer and suddenly believes everything she reads in all those musty old books Giles has, despite the fact vampires do not imply witches and singing demons (and despite the fact that those books were written by fallible people in a time of great superstition). Bella learns that vampires are real and is completely willing to believe that Jacob's people are werewolves (although to be fair, he does change right in front of her.

I can see one good reason for this attitude, which goes something like this: "Wow, I've just learned that everything I thought I knew about this one particular subject (vampires) is wrong. But I had good reasons for disbelieving before, since as far as I could tell there was no good evidence and my understanding of science made the claim very implausible. Clearly that reasoning, as strong as it seemed, turned out to be wrong. Maybe when I apply the same reasoning to dismiss claims of werewolves/Bigfoot/fairies/Cthulhu, that reasoning is flawed in the same way. Therefore I should provisionally accept these new claims as well, at least until I can piece my worldview back together in light of my new understanding of the existence of vampires."

However, people will still be people, even if magic or monsters exist. We KNOW how easy it is for someone to fool themself into thinking they have psychic powers, so even if someday a person demonstrates psychic abilities beyond a shadow of a doubt, there will still be thousands of self-deceived or intentionally deceptive people claiming to be psychic. If a Bigfoot is finally captured and verified by thousands of qualified scientists, there will still be people who see a bear or a chipmunk or a human in a suit and are convinced it was a Bigfoot. Even if there are real bloodsucking monsters, it will still be true that people throughout history saw their loved ones die for no reason and felt the need to make up stories about monsters to explain it.

What I'd love to see is a fantasy novel built on this premise--that a protagonist discovers that magic is real, but there are still more false magic claims than real ones. I can think of a few times I've seen this idea carried out: Martha Jones in Doctor Who asking the Doctor if witches are real, given that she's now learned about time travel and aliens; a story by Mercedes Lackey in which the protagonist learns how to expose false magic now that real magic has returned to the land. But I'd love to see a story in which this idea was front and center.

Jenna Moran said...

Maybe it's not that the vampire myths have nothing to do with the Cullens-style vampires, as that they have nothing to do with the two or three other kinds of vampires that are around and have nothing to do with the myths?

"So, Vlad, do you ever feel guilty about impaling all those people?"
"Huh? No, I'm not even Transylvanian."
"... your last name is 'The Impaler.'"
"THE IMPALA. I got hit by a radioactive CHEVY IMPALA."
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"... then why do you drink blood?"
"Look, sometimes, when people have supernatural accidents, drinking blood just happens. I think it's nature's antibody against superheroism. I mean, look at Mars. It got superheroes, and now it's just a red waste."
"Oh."
*pause*
"You're drooling, Vlad."
*pause*
"Vlad?"
"OH! Sorry. Um. Sorry. Just . . . thinking about Mars."

Silver Adept said...

@chris the cynic -

Curses, now I have a Bill Cosby routine stuck in my head. "Noah."

@Gelliebean -

I think your comments would be wonderful in the "Masqerade Burlesque" section of the Ramblite index. Do you think "Carlisle Cullen has been using the same name, photograph, and only changing his med school" would beat Alice dancing down the middle of Forks for the best manner in which the Cullens are daring people to find out the truth about them and they choose not to do it?

Ana Mardoll said...

Good idea. Link added. :)

Anton_Mates said...

"Look, sometimes, when people have supernatural accidents, drinking blood just happens. I think it's nature's antibody against superheroism.

This is so true. When Dark Forces turn you into an undead/demonic horror, they must roll a die to decide which bits of humans you'll have to consume to survive. Blood's romantic, cerebrospinal fluid less so. Souls are good if you're the non-confrontational type; nobody ever misses them. Brains are gross, but if you need to eat them you're probably mindless anyway so that's all right. Most people are hoping for the "drain people's life force through sexytimes" option, and you really don't want to become one of those Hindu corpse-demons that lives on poop.

Bella's just lucky she hasn't yet learned about the Quileute pack and their unholy lust for toenails.

Gelliebean said...

Sounds like a logic puzzle book to me.... :-D

"Bella is researching supernatural creatures to help her decide which boy she wants to date. From the clues provided below, can you determine the type of creature each boy is, his unique quality (one sparkles), the body part he prefers to snack on, and the search engine she used to find the information (one is Google)?

bekabot said...

"Bella's just lucky she hasn't yet learned about the Quileute pack and their unholy lust for toenails."

So, they're the ones who would be after Bella for her feet.

Silver Adept said...

@bekabot - I believe the appropriate response there is "sensible shoes!" - but I can't remember what movie that's from where the men are obsessive about this.

@Gelliebean - I think we could make that logic puzzle from the characters in Twilight. The real trick would be writing the clues that are properly obscure, like "Bella did not find out about the lycanthrope by a method that involves Internet access."

Marc Mielke said...

The much cooler Filipino vampire is the Pennangelan (sp?), which is a gorgeous woman by day, who sleeps in her coffin at night while her DISEMBODIED HEAD AND ENTRAILS fly about and feed like other, less cool, non self-decapitating vampires.

I'd think even seasoned monster hunters would lose their shit the first time they saw one of those.

Rikalous said...

Some cursory research tells me that the Penanngalan is Malaysian, not Filipino. The Philippines do have a similar critter with bat wings that detaches the whole upper body, and Japan has one that does the head thing, but leaves the entrails at home.

The Philippines also has my personal favorite blood-sucking creature of the night, the sigbin. They look like hornless goats (with long tails they can whip you with and huge ears they can clap like hands) that for some reason have chosen to walk around backwards with their head between their hind legs. They can also turn invisible, although I suspect that might be because they are just so bizarre they produce a Somebody Else's Problem field.

Post a Comment