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** Heinlein and computers always was... an odd combination, to say the least. He made an equally bizarre description of a computerized missile aiming in the ''Literature/CitizenOfTheGalaxy'', and his description of the ''Gay Deceiver'' main computer is one of the highlights of TechnologyMarchesOn page. It is possible that he simply didn't really understand computers -- and, anyway, he was consistently behind the curve: 1953 was the year the very first ''high level'' UsefulNotes/ProgrammingLanguage, FORTRAN, was being readied for release by IBM, finally allowing programmers more or less ''natural'' communication with their machines.
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** Heinlein and computers always was... an odd combination, to say the least. He made an equally bizarre description of a computerized missile aiming in the ''Literature/CitizenOfTheGalaxy'', and his description of the ''Gay Deceiver'' main computer is one of the highlights of TechnologyMarchesOn page. It is possible that he simply didn't really understand computers -- and, anyway, he was consistently behind the curve: 1953 was the year the very first ''high level'' UsefulNotes/ProgrammingLanguage, MediaNotes/ProgrammingLanguage, FORTRAN, was being readied for release by IBM, finally allowing programmers more or less ''natural'' communication with their machines.
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* RestAndResupplyStop: As is common in science fiction universes where interstellar travel is accomplished by way of a portal network (the "Horst congruencies") there is a Rest-and-Resupply Stop on a planetary scale, in the form of Garson's Planet. Garson's Planet is bitterly cold, with an unbreathable methane atmosphere; it is "the least unpleasant" of the thirteen planets of its star, Theta Centauri. However, the Theta Centauri System is at the other end of the Solar System's sole Horst congruency...but there are half a dozen other congruencies accessible from Theta Centauri, and Garson's Planet has therefore become "the inevitable cross-roads for trade of the Solar Union". While parts of it are evidently rather high-class, the parts directly depicted in the novel tend to the seedy side, with lots of bars (complete with bar girls) and other "tawdry inducements for the stranger to part with cash".
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* InnocentlyInsensitive: When Max asks one of his mentors, Chief Computerman Kelly, why he isn't in the Astrogators Guild, Kelly gets sad and comments that he had a chance once but failed and "[n]ow I know my limitations."
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* FamousFamousFictional: "Bees have cities, ants have cities, challawabs have cities." And from that same conversation: "Just like ''Literature/RobinsonCrusoe'', or ''Literature/SwissFamilyRobinson''--I can't keep those two straight. Or the first men on Venus."
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* FoldThePageFoldTheSpace: Max explains the "anomalies" that allow for interstellar travel by folding Ellie's scarf (which conveniently even has a stylized picture of the Solar System on it, allowing him to talk about the difference it makes in traveling from "Mars" to "Jupiter" with or without the scarf folded over).
