"That sounds like an interesting sociology experiment except for the involvement of the magic hat."

"There're real personality differences. Everyone knew my father'd be a Ravenclaw by the time he was three, and I am told it became obvious I was a Slytherin around the same age, though when I was six I heard that most Ministers of Magic have been Hufflepuffs and started pretending to be driven by hard work, justness, and so on - fooled some people, did not fool the hat -"

"...that is adorable."

"Know alternate universe versions of anyone else well enough to guess their houses?"

"I don't think I'll award myself any points for figuring that the one of your brothers who at least in Elf form is named rather presciently after his dad is a Ravenclaw too?"

"That's Minor. And yes, he is."

"Do people literally name children 'Minor' in your era?"

"...yes? Is that something future people find objectionable."

"It's not a serious social controversy or anything but it is deeply unfashionable. Your name ages pretty well and does not call into question whether you will experience paradox upon reaching the age of majority."

"Timothy, Michael, Theodore, Aaron, Minor, James, Samuel."

"James is a girl's name now."

"...huh. And no special resemblance to the lookalikes' names - it is more than just lookalikes, really, isn't it -"

"Name resemblance - exists? It is not overwhelming. And I thought that was clear at this point."

"I am struggling to think of explanations, but - yeah, does sound like it. Anyway, Michael's a Slytherin with me, Theodore's a Gryffindor, Aaron and Minor and Samuel are Ravenclaws, James is a Hufflepuff - twins don't usually split, they were a little disappointed - my parents were both Ravenclaws -"

"I am not closely socially acquainted with the Elf versions but all right."

"- the war, or -"

"The war. They seemed like nice enough people, we had a good working relationship."

"Maybe once everything is resolved I will go check in on them. I sort of doubt they're okay and - maybe it'd help if they were needed to fix my world."

"Maybe."

Reading! "Can I have my notebooks back to copy them really quickly, I want to make some edits -"

"Yeah." Cam shoves them across the bar surface. "The ruminating on who to marry is startlingly unromantic; 2179 frowns on mixing politics and marital status. I don't actually know how Elves feel about it."

"If you got rid of all the hereditary titles you could probably mostly stifle political marriages but I can't imagine there'd stop being practical ones."

"Admittedly the case - though a lot less so post-scarcity, much less tempting to marry for money at that point - but it's customary to at least heavily frost the decisionmaking process with at least a pretense of affection."

"Once I pick someone I'll court her, I just - can't seem to grasp the appeal of using feelings to choose someone instead of developing them for someone you chose."

"I suppose that's pragmatic" and also totally a cover but in 1802 some people don't know yet when they're seventeen probably and maybe it doesn't actually match.