[0xdeadbeefbabe]

Okay, I hope this convinces you it's a leap instead of a pretty big leap:

He lives in a seemingly boring world, but it isn't boring after all. It may not even be a world after all. He invents solutions using the contrived rules i.e. using a purple crayon. Some of the solutions become problems. For example the dragon scares him and makes his hand shake, so he falls into the water, but he comes up thinking fast and makes a sailboat.

Both these lines remind me of computers or programming:

Nine identical pieces of pie that Harold likes best.

A forest with just one tree in it.

Also word play is important in programming and in HATPK.

Lots of things are more like programming than things obviously designated that way such as programming languages. In Hoare's communicating sequential processes he goes on and on about vending machines for example.