How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph) or (Feed Chatter #.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Later after some showers we went to the Ricochet Lounge. It was very lo-grav/no-grav, and it was all about whamming one person into another in a bit stuffed suits. The place had been hip, like, a year and a half ago. The slogan was "Slam the Ones You Love!" Now the place just looked old and sad. The walls were all marked up from people hitting them. (2.9)
The Ricochet Lounge is some sort of like a super high-tech version of laser tag, but on the moon and with no gravity. So, basically awesome. If there's a good use for technology, lo-grav laser tag is definitely it.
Quote #2
Behind the girl in gray was a big window and you could see we were in a bubble way high up over the moon. Down on the ground, tourists were riding big proteins across the craters. All the stars were out. (3.7)
Huh. We're having a hard time getting a visual here, because how in the world you ride on a protein? Does that mean some of those steaks from the meat farm are romping around with people on their backs? Or people are zooming over those craters in glasses of milk? We have no clue, and really—it doesn't matter. The whole point is that it's high-tech, and that's enough.
Quote #3
And the feed was pouring in on us now, all of it, all of the feednet, and we could feel all of our favorites, and there were our files, and our m-chatlines. It came down on us like water. It came down like frickin' spring rains, and we were dancing in it. (17.27)
Titus compares the communication he's getting from his newly-restored feed with rain falling down on him and his friends. This shows us the extent to which technology has been intertwined with their lives: something completely unnatural (the feed) seems as natural—and as right—as rain.
Quote #4
We went to a DVS Pharmacy Superstore, and she comparison-shopped for home endoscopy kits.
... I picked up a box. "This one is the cheapest. You swallow the pills and they take pictures as they go down." (22.43, 45)
Okay, (1), awesome. Seriously. This is another fantastic use of technology, and can we please make this happen? But (2), Titus doesn't get Violet's game here. He's thinks they're actually comparison shopping, while Violet's instead trying to screw up her corporate profile so she can be invisible to the feed.
Quote #5
"So they're sitting there, and my dad holds up his hand, and it has this big lump on one of the fingers, like some kind of cyst? And my mom's like Steve, what's that, is it malignant? And he goes, Honey, I hope it's benign, and he pulls a little pull-tab and the skin unpeels and under it is an engagement ring for her, already on his finger! So he takes it off and slips it on her finger and it constricts and clamps on and she's like, Omigod! Omigod! And everyone in the restaurant starts clapping. And she's like, No, I don't have any like circulation to my finger, and so they had to go to a jeweler really quick and get it adjusted." (29.7)
First: gross. People are eating, dude. Second, we really don't recommend putting on a ring that has recently emerged from a cyst (whether of the benign of malignant variety). Third, and more to the point, the people of future Earth apparently have so much bonus technology that they can put it to really foul use. Must be nice.
Quote #6
She would constantly be whispering jokes to me, little jokes between the two of us. She especially made fun of plastic. She'd say, "They're all wearing oil. All their clothes. They don't have anything on but oil." I would whisper back to her, "They're wearing dinosaurs. Dead dinosaurs drippy all over them." (43.7)
Violet and her mom joke about one of the biggest technological innovations of the industrial revolution: the ability to use oil, which is in almost everything. Think about this next time you put on your best stretchy skinny jeans.
Quote #7
That's a great feeling, squelching, like in mud. Do you know, mud? When it's in your yard? And you know the day's going to get hot again when the rain's over, because that's what the neighborhood association has decided? So you can just stand there and wait for the sun? (43.9)
Forget about indoor air-conditioning, heaters and fans. We don't have anything on the advancements in Titus's world. They can control the weather within each neighborhood—or even within each individual yard.
Quote #8
The feed was trying to mop up my headache. I could feel it doing nerve blocks. (50.3)
Okay, another use of technology we can definitely get behind. Having your feed block your headache sure beats popping Ibuprofen—although, tbh, who knows about the side effects?
Quote #9
When school ended for the year, Link and Marty and I went to one of the moons of Jupiter to stay with Marty's aunt for a few weeks. It was okay. We had a pretty good time. (55.1)
When Link, Marty, and Titus finish SchoolTM for the year, they head to the moons of Jupiter. Bully for them. We count ourselves lucky when we can make it to Disney World.
Quote #10
Miles of suburban bubbles, the shafts, the tubes, the pods. Pennants advertising malls. Trailer parks on miles of concrete, with window boxes covered in ash. Upcars flashing past, their prices speaking to me in my head. (57.73)
Titus gives us a glimpse of his world as if we're seeing an overhead pan shot from a movie, like the gritty streetscape of Blade Runner or the sparkling towers of Coruscant in Attack of the Clones. It's a sweeping, cinematic view that shows us how both sides live: the haves in their suburban bubbles, and the have-nots in the trailer parks.