Re curbs ... WWII Waterhouse was in London waiting for traffic and had one of those stream of consciousness runs that if people had light bulbs on their hats and you only saw lights going up and down you could time them and eventually work out a map of London. I thought it nicely captured the type of insanity required of a crytpo pattern-seeker like him.
People and events and ideas from Cryptonomicon weave in and out of the Baroque Trilogy. I don't really recommend three 900 page books to someone without knowing them better, but I enjoyed the vast majority of the trilogy a lot. Lots of crypto (hidden messages) in long, rambling letters where every 100th
word is significant or some such. A funny look at history here and there. And a computer with gold bar punch
cards.