Cav's Place

What must be stated clearly from the beginning is that, after many years and wrong turns, Anne Rice is back, and so is Lestat. Of course, those who expect the exact same Lestat they initially grew to know, from The Vampire Lestat and The Queen of the Damned, may be disappointed, but in the end that’s their fault alone. After all, not even the most resilient and rigid immortal would emerge without being deeply altered by everything Lestat went through from Queen of the Damned onward and, while admittedly on a merely mundane level, the same can be said about Anne Rice herself.
Prince Lestat may be, more than anything, a rather direct sequel to The Queen of the Damned, but also, while it doesn’t particularly dwell on them, it stands firmly by the events depicted in The Tale of the Body Thief and Memnoch the Devil and includes characters and references to important moments from The Vampire Armand, Blood and Gold and Pandora. Yes, that means it completely ignores Merrick, Blackwood Farm and Blood Canticle, and also Vittorio, but that’s pretty much as it should be. I don’t think it exactly contradicts the events depicted in those books, but can’t really say that I recall much from them, so there may be things that don’t add up, especially regarding the Talamasca. Still, those parts of the series are probably better off forgotten either way, though the one somewhat unpleasant aspect of that is the lack of any reference to the Mayfairs, as depicted in Lives of the Mayfair Witches, and maybe even the Taltos.

In short, as long as expectations remain reasonable, Prince Lestat has much to offer those who enjoyed the first half of The Vampire Chronicles, as well as the story of Marius and those directly related to it. The atmosphere of those earlier books has returned, for better or worse along with Anne Rice’s obsessions and her detailed descriptions of immense wealth, opulence and old-fashioned luxury and behavior. The history and lore of the Undead, as well as of the Talamasca, are presented in even greater detail than before. And readers have the chance to catch up with the old characters and understand the new ones, which are properly introduced and explained, so their presence and their connections to the others and the events make sense. In fact, the earlier books in the series are directly referenced on numerous occasions, including exact quotes and, in one case, even page numbers, both as a way to clarify those connections and to reinforce the myth the entire series relies on.
But does this mean that this book is only intended for fans of the series? Well, yes and no. Yes because properly understanding certain details and nuances does tend to require knowing everything that took place up to the end of The Queen of the Damned and quite a number of important later events, and no because pretty much the entire first half of the book is in fact an extended introduction, using the guise of presenting characters to ease new readers into the story and remind existing fans of facts they may have forgotten over the years. And yes, this means there’s very little actual action for about half the book, and in fact there’s not that much of that even later, and the moments that do exist do seem rather forced and rushed, but here I’ll return to keeping expectations reasonable and say that a significant amount of actual action isn’t the point of Prince Lestat, nor is it exactly necessary at this point in the series.

Moving on to specifics, the first thing that struck me was Rose, who immediately gave me the impression of being the author’s alter ego, through which she presents how she sees her relationship with her characters, and with Lestat most of all, and also moments of her life, events that shaped her or at least her state of mind at certain points in time. Now I didn’t check to see what Anne Rice herself said about this or what others dug up, in part because I don’t want to be disappointed by possibly finding that she refuses to admit it, but this to me adds significantly to the impact and, for lack of a better term, the meaningfulness of Prince Lestat.
On the other hand, while I understand the need to limit the level of detail about some characters, even to the point of leaving some secondary ones rather one-dimensional, in order to focus more on recreating the overall atmosphere and presenting more of the history and lore, I must say I was unpleasantly surprised that the entire Marius and Pandora story was only very barely alluded to, and even that in a way that seemed wrong to me. Seeing as a chapter was dedicated to Marius and another, while admittedly not dedicated to her, specifically included Pandora, I expected more… Or perhaps I needed more, considering the impact that part of Blood and Gold had on me at the time and the connections that story creates in my mind.

But speaking of those one-dimensional characters, and also returning to the relative lack of action in order to explain it in another way, one must understand that Anne Rice’s vampires are Romantics, with a capital “R”. Sure, not all to the same extent, some perhaps hardly at all, but those she prefers and focuses on, most of those who rise to positions that make them truly significant, they live for beauty, for creativity, for art, for emotions and passions and sensations, and for the deep bonds they form with others. They can easily become extraordinarily fixated on another, or on a source, or a form, of beauty, so much so that their dedication will appear to go well beyond what the vast majority of people would consider sick obsession.
However, that definitely doesn’t mean they’re weak. Instead, it means their capacity to love and cherish and appreciate is so much greater. It means the emotions and sensations they’re able to experience are so much more intense. It means they can focus so much better, and treasure and maintain, and possibly improve, what they have, instead of always being distracted or even actively looking for something better, or even simply something different, as most humans do. And, while at times it can definitely prove to be a weakness, overall this may well be their greatest strength.

That said, Fareed and the other scientists do seem rather out of place, but their role is properly explained, as is how they came to be. In addition, the very fact that they’re out of place is pointed out quite a number of times, from both directions, but so is the fact that they’re necessary. Anne Rice does tend to take the easy way out, largely skipping over any scientific and technological details that she perhaps can’t properly grasp, or that she simply believes many readers won’t, by stating that the main characters neither know nor particularly care about those issues, but at the same time it’s stressed that no society, not even one of immortals, can continue to exist in the present day and age without embracing science and technology and the knowledge and the advances they bring.
On the other hand, it’s also pointed out, repeatedly, that all this knowledge can easily be misused and new developments can also have negative consequences, both intended and unintended, and measures must be taken to reduce these risks as much as possible. And this is just one of the many considerations, opinions, pieces of social commentary, philosophy or bits of wisdom that make Prince Lestat more than a simple story. Depending on the reader’s stance on the respective issues, these may be seen as either positive or negative aspects, but the different characters do, in quite a number of cases, allow for multiple different and even conflicting points of view to be presented, offering arguments in favor of each.

And now, please allow me to finish this the same way I started: Anne Rice is back, and so is Lestat. This book breathes new life, or perhaps a better term would be new unlife, into the series, pulling it together and paving the way toward a potentially exciting future. It truly belongs within The Vampire Chronicles, using many of the elements which deserve to be remembered as its foundation while ignoring those which perhaps do not. It selects characters and events which had previously been offered too little, if any, time and space and presents them properly, ensuring that they make sense both on their own and as part of the story and offering them a chance to shine or, at the very least, setting the stage for future books to do so.
True, it may be mainly intended for existing fans of the series who have forgotten some details since reading the rest, but it’s written in a way that allows it to remain quite enjoyable for new readers as well, while those who, quite the contrary, need no reminders or recaps but nevertheless enjoy the style and atmosphere should also have little to complain about. So yes, as this review likely also proves, nostalgia, fond memories, mental and emotional links and just the right amount of forgetfulness definitely help improve one’s opinion of it, but none are truly required in order to clearly state that Prince Lestat is simply a good book… At least as long as expectations remain reasonable and readers don’t demand it to be something it neither is nor needs to be.

Rating: 4/5

With the trial period expiring, last night I uninstalled AVG AntiVirus 2015 and installed Trend Micro Antivirus+, which seems to have gone well enough so far, in terms of not causing any noticeable problems. However, I can say right away that, while it seems to have a lower constant impact on performance than others despite the fact that the tests I saw said otherwise, this is not an option for the future because it seems to follow the “set and forget” design philosophy more than any others I tried so far, offering few settings or methods of customization. I mean, there are definitely no options regarding updates and it doesn’t even seem to notify when it checks and installs, no options for manual scans either, very few for the active scanning module, no way to only set exceptions for only certain types of scanning and so on, so I’m just hoping it’ll at least continue to cause no problems as I’ll simply wait out the month and then move to the next one on the list.

Did make an attempt to also finish Age of Wonders yesterday, but after defeating the third enemy as well I eventually changed those plans, so I only got rid of the last one earlier today. As I was saying, don’t care to play the Cult of Shadows campaign, go back and make other choices in the Keeper one or play any individual scenarios, finishing the Keeper campaign with the standard Dwarf and Elf choices being quite enough to call it the second game finished this year. Already updated the comment for it on my games played page, and since I don’t intend to write a proper review, that’s all there is to it and now I’m wondering whether I’ll actually manage to get back to King of Dragon Pass.

And while I’m here, should also mention that I did end up running this week as well, last evening, this being part of the reason why I left finishing Age of Wonders for today. Noticed that it was somewhat cloudy in the evening and with the forecast for the next few days being of even higher temperatures, I just gave it a try, leaving about ten minutes later than last week and managing only 23:29, so my worst time yet in the park. Was rather hot though, even at that hour, and definitely still crowded and requiring me to weave around people and slow down or even briefly stop when there was simply no room to keep going. Saw far more runners than ever before, however, and yet others were only arriving as I was leaving.

Yes, I finished Prince Lestat yesterday, but didn’t make the quick review for it this week’s second post. That’s because I’ve been trying to figure out how to fit what I mean to say about it into about 300 or, at the very most, up to 400 words, which would be as far as I could possibly stretch the “quick review” limits, and don’t quite see how it’d work, so decided to take my time and actually write a proper review for it, even if it’ll be pointless to do so for such a popular title that has already been reviewed thousands of times and in so many places. Now let’s see if I’ll actually manage to write that next week.
Should also say that no, I didn’t just reach this decision today, so may have avoided the Sunday update by writing this yesterday, but instead of trying to just rush a post last evening, I decided to leave it for today to give myself both some more time for the post itself and a chance to finish Age of Wonders before writing it, as I’m at the last scenario and already defeated two of the four enemies. That didn’t work, however, as I didn’t play for long, but I should get that done one of these days as well and consider it the second game finished this year, even if I’ll just do the Keeper campaign and with the standard choices of Dwarves and Elves. Definitely no plans to go back and make other choices, nor to play through the Cult of Storms campaign… And none for a review either, so I’ll probably just mark the moment in a post and update the comment and, if necessary, score on my games played page.

Otherwise, there was no hot water between Tuesday morning and Thursday evening, by far the most unpleasant effect of that being that my dermatitis really acted up due to the combination of heat, sweat and no showers for three days, and trying to wash with cold water in the sink seemed, if anything, to make matters worse at least where my cock’s concerned. My head and chest remained manageable, but by the time I finally could wash properly again, the bottom side of my dick looked and felt as if it had been put through hot oil, even starting to see blood where the skin was pretty much gone for good. But at least things were significantly better by yesterday, after being able to clean the area with warm water again and doing that several times per day while also doing my best to keep it from sticking to anything and using a little of the cheap moisturizing cream I still have around, since the calendula extract one seemed to make things worse. At one point, Thursday night, I even used a little after shave, since I have the alcohol-free kind for sensitive skin, and also a tiny amount of baking soda, though I’m not sure how much either of those helped. The baking soda sure stung though.
And while I’m here, should also mention the second effect of the lack of hot water, which was that I had to give up on the plan of running Tuesday evening. That was sorted out as well, Friday evening, when I missed the week’s New Horizons briefing, knowing I’ll be able to watch the recording later, and went to the park late, being 9:15 PM by the time I even reached the entrance. Understandably, it was quite crowded and plenty of others were also running, or skating, or cycling, weaving their way through the crowds, but it did seem slightly less of a problem than three weeks ago. May have simply felt like it though, since there still were moments when I simply had to stop for a moment and wait for a little path to clear and the time was 22:55 despite pushing a fair amount whenever I could. That’s only 25 seconds better than the previous time the crowds were a serious problem, despite better weather, as it was after sunset, and more effort.

Speaking of the weather, this afternoon’s been cloudy and windy, so the heat wasn’t a problem, though I’m not sure how it is outside. Actually considered to go for another run after posting this, so I’ll easily skip next week, when the conditions really don’t seem suitable, but eventually decided against it. I guess I’ll either try again during an evening, possibly even closer to 10 PM and likely before Friday, or just “cash in” on the extra run I already have and skip it anyway, as there’d still be no need to make up for it later.
I guess I’ll check some more things on-line and then get back to Age of Wonders instead, though I strongly doubt I’ll be able to finish it today. Either way, at midnight I’ll have to check to see whether my trial of AVG AntiVirus 2015 expired or not, as I believe the last day should be tomorrow but it’s not exactly clear. Would really prefer not to have to worry about it until at least Tuesday, as there is a chance there will be another activists’ meeting tomorrow, but I guess I’ll do what I’ll have to do, whenever I’ll have to do it, and hope nothing will get messed up as a result of switching yet again.

And before ending this I’ll also mention that I noticed another potential computer issue, and if it’s a real issue it could be a serious one and require replacing important components and therefore returning to the old one for a while. But it may also be something else, such as a driver conflict or some Windows glitch that may remain relatively harmless, at least as long as it won’t happen with increasing frequency or generate actual problems and not simply some warnings in the event log, so for the moment I’d rather not say more about it. Sort of trying to see if it goes away if I ignore it, if you will, though I do plan to post some questions somewhere else in the near future.

Earlier this month, after exchanging a few messages with someone and then going to take a shower, I ended up posting a small stream of shower thoughts on Facebook. The idea was just to post this quickly somewhere, while I could still remember how to put at least the general idea into words, and then perhaps expand upon it in a blog post during the next week or so. However, that obviously didn’t happen and I don’t want to allow this to be doomed to oblivion as it scrolls down and out of reach, so I’ll just quickly also post it here now, with only minor edits.

You know, I’ve always found it odd…
If a person doesn’t have, or can’t use, say, their arms, people don’t usually expect them to play tennis for example. And when some rare individuals manage it, it is an extraordinary achievement and seen as such, nobody expecting or pressuring them into doing it as “normal” otherwise. And, to move to more mundane matters, the aforementioned people also won’t be expected to, for example, bathe themselves either, and while managing that won’t be praised as such an achievement publicly because the matter itself isn’t public, it will usually be seen as such by those who are close to them, who also won’t demand that they manage it as “normal” and usually be understanding and accommodating if they can’t, or if they can no longer do it after somehow managing to at some point.
Yet at the same time, if a person doesn’t have the proper mental tools to do some things or cope with some situations seen by most as “normal”, the matter is entirely different. What you get then is insane pressure from all sides to manage to behave as if you had said tools and proper use of them and usually no understanding except from those who’re in a similar situation. And if you somehow, through who knows what effort and at who knows what cost to yourself, do manage to do those things or cope with those situations you’re not actually equipped for, the reaction is usually something along the lines of: “See? That wasn’t so bad, right? Told you you could do it.” And, of course, if you don’t keep doing it from that point on, you’re just slacking off.
And then Gods, or whatever else, if anything, may be out there, forbid somebody with such a, shall we say, atypically tooled mind is actually fine with it as it is and would just rather focus on what they can do well the way they are rather than constantly fighting themselves and likely ruining themselves in other ways just to struggle to make up for what they’re not. They’re really going to get it for that sort of nerve, right?
And then some still wonder why some people snap. So they get even warier of those who may not adhere to the, shall we say, norms of “normal”, either watch them even more carefully or distance themselves from them even more, increase the pressure or the isolation or both, make it even harder to find understanding, companionship, belonging, safety, a soothing word or touch… And then wonder again why even more people snap because of it.

As I said, this needs to be expanded on, requires explanations, definitions, exceptions… But I’m sure you can find all, or at least most, of that in what others have said and written about it, some doing so much better than I ever could. At the same time, many have done it much worse, even dangerously so, while for most the matter is swept under the rug, actively hidden and ignored. And if the best time to change this situation was decades ago, when the human mind started being understood to some extent, the second best time is now, and the third best in the nearest possible future.

As everyone should most definitely know, NASA‘s New Horizons spacecraft successfully flew by Pluto on July 14. As such, with Dawn also at Ceres since March, 2015 is the year when humanity first explored not only its first but its first two dwarf planets, or possibly the first three if you consider Charon‘s situation. This comes 26 years after Voyager 2‘s 1989 Neptune flyby, which completed the initial exploration of the major planets and sadly, along with the same spacecraft’s 1986 Uranus flyby, remains the only time humanity got anywhere near the ice giants. Also, bar absolutely shocking breakthroughs in propulsion and space travel, this will most likely remain the only time any man-made object will be in Pluto‘s vicinity for centuries to come.
This doesn’t, however, mean we’ve already received all the information we’re going to receive about Pluto; in fact far from it. The initial “browse set” may be winding down these days, but this is merely a very small and heavily compressed selection of what was gathered, meant to give the team and public something to look at quickly in case there will be problems later. The schedule then calls for the sending of a data set that doesn’t need to be analyzed right away and which should also be of little public interest, so the team will be able to take a well-deserved vacation before a heavily compressed version of the entire data set will start being sent, starting around the middle of September. Only after this will be safely on the ground, close to the end of the year, will the spacecraft even begin to send the complete, lossless data set, an operation scheduled to be completed no earlier than next October, and that’s assuming there will be no problems or delays.

And this brings me to probably the most frequently asked questions and the most common reasons why people who are too impatient and too used to instant gratification keep posting all sorts of angry messages. Of course, there are also the usual and expected conspiracy theories and those deeply bothered by the simple fact that any money are spent on space exploration, but a lot of the time people don’t seem to understand that the spacecraft truly does communicate at a painfully slow rate and downloading each file takes a long time. And that’s now, when New Horizons actually does seem to be sending data most of the time, because during the encounter phase it only communicated when it didn’t need to make observations, as it can’t do both at the same time.
What’s interesting is that New Horizons actually sends data faster than initially estimated, as the best speed I’ve seen reported is 2.11 kbps even though the mission plan assumed only 1 kbps at Pluto. And yes, that’s bits, so divide by eight for bytes. Admittedly, the fact that Voyager 2 managed 21600 bits per second, so a good ten times better, at Neptune may make those numbers appear particularly poor, considering the time that passed and the fact that most of the difference isn’t justified by the difference in distance, but New Horizons’ components were severely limited by size, weight, available power and, perhaps most of all, funding, so the team is doing the best they can with what they have. And, of course, there’s a lot more that needs to be sent than the eye candy people want so badly.

On top of that, since I’ve been trying to help in what little way I could by answering questions on the mission’s Facebook page and on the related posts on the NASA Solar System Exploration page, I can say there have been a few issues that were brought up infuriatingly often. Whether that was done via questions or statements, including harsh ones at times, all too many people proved not merely a lack of understanding, but also a lack of willingness to do as much as a simple search, both of which are disappointing but at the same time entirely unsurprising. As such, seeing as there are many excellent sources of answers and explanations available to anyone who actually is interested, I won’t even mention those other matters here.

What I do want to mention here, however, is the whole debate regarding Pluto’s planet status. Or, more specifically, I want to state very clearly that there should be no debate whatsoever on the matter and Pluto should have stopped being considered a major planet as soon as it was discovered that Charon doesn’t orbit it, but instead they both orbit a common center of mass placed between the two, outside Pluto. I couldn’t find exactly when that was determined, so do tell me if you know at least an exact year, but it was definitely known at least since some point during the ’90s and that’s when it should have been clearly stated that, as it doesn’t even dominate its own immediate vicinity, on its own Pluto has less of a claim to the status of major planet than even Ceres, which at the time was considered nothing more than an asteroid.
Speaking of Ceres, the very fact that it was considered a planet back when it was first discovered, in 1801, and then demoted to the status of asteroid as other bodies were discovered in the same general area of the solar system proves that dominating its orbit and clearing it of other bodies of roughly comparable size has been one of the criteria for determining what is and what isn’t a planet since at least the 19th century. It may not have been part of a formal definition, but it was there in practice, plus that we didn’t exactly have a formal definition before 2006. As such, the discovery of Eris and the realization that dozens or likely even hundreds of similar bodies were waiting to be discovered in that part of the solar system gave a second, very clear, reason to demote not only Pluto, but also a potential Pluto-Charon binary.
And that’s what should actually be discussed now, whether Pluto and Charon should in fact be considered a binary dwarf planet and therefore create this category, and my stance is that they definitely should be. After all, Charon doesn’t actually orbit Pluto, so it’s not a moon, and Pluto doesn’t only orbit the Sun, so it’s not a planet, dwarf or otherwise. Taken together, however, their barycenter does orbit the Sun and they dominate their immediate vicinity, as the other moons orbit both of them. Add the fact that they didn’t clear their orbit of other bodies of roughly comparable size and what we end up with is the very clear classification of Pluto and Charon as a binary dwarf planet. It’s the only classification that makes sense, rationally, unless of course someone prefers to ignore the fact that they’re massive enough to have reached hydrostatic equilibrium and wants to call them asteroids, as it happened to Ceres for about a century and a half.
To conclude, as long as you actually analyze the facts, which has actually been done since at least the late ’90s, Pluto’s obviously not a major, or classical, planet and I stand firm by the statement that all those who claim otherwise base their stance on nothing more than emotions and habit. At the same time, the IAU did approach the issue rather wrong when they made it obvious that their primary goal in creating a clear definition for planets was to prevent the list from growing too long with the addition of the new discoveries, and missed a huge opportunity when they chose to limit themselves to creating the dwarf planet category without also allowing for binary dwarf planets. But if they finally fixed some past mistakes, maybe they’ll fix this one as well in the not too distant future.

And now, before ending this post, please allow me to return to New Horizons and congratulate the team for this outstanding achievement. I also wish to deeply thank everyone involved, from janitors to team leaders and everyone in between, for their hard work and dedication. Thank you for reminding us, or at least those of us who may still care, to look up. Thank you for inspiring humanity, for offering hope, for proving what humans can truly achieve if even a small number of bright, talented, dedicated individuals set their minds to it and are granted even a tiny fraction of the resources the world wastes on pointless or downright harmful endeavors time and time again. This, and Dawn, and Rosetta and Philae, and also a few, all too few, other projects happening down here on Earth, these are the sort of things we should care for, support and focus on far more. And by “we” I mean humanity, all of us, wherever we are and however else we define ourselves, whichever boxes we choose to put ourselves and others into.
However, and I must apologize to the team for saying so, what I can hope for now is that this won’t remain such a notable achievement for too long, because far greater ones will follow it soon enough. Sadly, with the way things are going, that’s a terribly slim hope. But then again, when isn’t hope on a diet?