"Triinary twoct-six sound good?"

"It sounds bizarre, because I'm not accustomed to octal, but sure!"

"That's fair, I guess.  How old are you; we can at least get the year sort of right . . ."

"...I am a hundred and seventy two and was born in 1987, I don't think you can do that either. I stopped aging when I was 22?"

" - Yeah, okay, sure.  Uh, you do look around 22 so I'm not going to worry too much about whether our years are different lengths or anything . . ."  Write write.

"They are! Honestly considering how many ways this world is different it's nothing short of miraculous that I can have a conversation with you, since I only got your cats' language by magic."

"Wow.  They're just - the same?"

"Mostly, yeah. The octal thing is different and we call it English not Latin but it's nothing I noticed reading a casual cross-section of assorted encyclopedia articles."

"That's really weird!  When the stars align, I guess.  Anyway, this is done; does Cricket want to say goodbye to anyone on the way back out front?"

Cam asks, and reports back, "He says none of them are worth his time."

"Alrighty then."  Walk walk.  "Could I get the most recent Feranli sales catalog?"

"Voilà."

She picks out a combo model that can handle both magnestrip boxes and flatdisks and does an excited little shoulder-shimmy upon receiving it.  She passes Cam a few coins since probably this isn't the only thing he'll need local currency for and she's still getting a deal.  "Uh, does he have any feedback for me?  Like, if the thing he didn't like about his cage was the size there's not a lot I can do about it, but anything fixable I'd want to know."

Cam asks about this! "...he says the cage is too small, the food was terrible, there's not enough fresh air, he doesn't like how you smell, some of the dogs bark too much, he objects to linoleum, and the vet's hands were cold."

"I'll see what I can do.  Tell him thanks."

"...he says, uh, you're welcome, slightly embellished. He's not very polite."

"I already knew that, if not uh, through language.  Do you have any questions or anything for me; how are you handling being in a new universe, hanging in there okay?"

"Oh, it's very exciting. Still getting oriented but then I hope to end material scarcity!"

"Wow.  Uh.  Good luck with that?"

"Thanks!"

"Yeah!  And I mean I don't know what you would really need a modestly-employed New Year's Eve kid's help with, but if there's anything I can do - I guess you might need more stuff with the shelter; I can do that.  . . . And you probably don't know any of the birthday stereotypes, do you.  A modestly-employed random person."

"I do not know of the stereotypes. Is there some kind of almanac I should keep handy?"

"Tons!  I can't recommend like a definitive one though."

"What's one that's, like, reasonably accessible and not too misleading or wordy."

"I guess threaten to whip me I'd go with 'Ava Lestern's Astrological All-About'?"