So, there is a little oblique paragraph on page 39 at the bottom. Since I'm absolutely new...can anyone properly explain the ability and reason for using type casting with a "non-base -10 int"? No idea what that even means...

and I found that this is a type fo function that allows you to convert from a type of php data to another type, but I think as we are a beginners we are not going to use soon, so its not that much important now.
If you interested in knowing more a bout it you can check this site : http://us2.php.net/manual/en/function.intval.php
its really amazing and you can find any answer about php and how to use functions and many many examples