"Then: I google "time-series visualization" and start work on a new version of my model, thinking that maybe I can impress her with a prototype. I am… - Robin Sloan

I am really into the type of girl you can impress with a prototype.

Scoping myself out in my standup mirror, I turned and gently twerked.

He's like a storybook spirit, a little djinn or something, except instead of air or water his element is imagination.

"Have you ever played Maximum Happy Imagination?"
"Sounds like a Japanese game show."
Kat straightens her shoulders. "Okay, we're going to play. To start, imagine the future. The good future. No nuclear bombs. Pretend you're a science fiction writer."
Okay: "World government... no cancer... hover-boards."
"Go further. What's the good future after that?"
"Spaceships. Party on Mars."
"Further."
"Star Trek. Transporters. You can go anywhere."
"Further."
"I pause a moment, then realize: "I can't."
Kat shakes her head. "It's really hard. And that's, what, a thousand years? What comes after that? What could possibly come after that? Imagination runs out. But it makes sense, right? We probably just imagine things based on what we already know, and we run out of analogies in the thirty-first century.