Work Text:
“If love was easy, we would be writing poems about better things. Like pizza.”
“Correction. You would be writing poems.”
“That’s right, you’d code about it.”
“How would I code about pizza?”
“I’m sure you’d find a way.” Nursey taps the cheap ballpoint pen he stole from the last hotel the team stayed in against his chin. “ If pizza, then happy.”
“Okay, number one, that’s not even how if/then loops work. Number two, and I repeat, how would I code about pizza?”
“I just told you.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Ask Chowder, then, I’m sure he could think of something.”
“He knows a lot more about programming than you do, anyway, so it’s more likely.”
“I know you said that wasn’t how if/then loops worked, but I’m putting it in my poem anyway.”
Dex stares. “You’re writing a poem about pizza?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
if love was easy, we would be
writing poems about better things
like pizza.
if pizza, then happy.
It’s a work in progress, but Nursey likes the way it’s going. Their assignment is to write a poem in a style randomly drawn from a wicker basket the professor has for this exact purpose. Nursey’s said ‘elision, plain language, mundane subject’. Language doesn’t get much plainer than what he has so far. (The lack of capital letters wasn’t required, but come on, he knows what code looks like, after spending so much time around Dex, Chowder, and Tango. It fits.)
love = random.randint(0,1)
poem = “here is the poem. ”
easy = 1
iff love == easy
subject = pizza
print(poem + pizza)
else
subject = love
print(poem + love)
“I thought your project was supposed to be Java?” Chowder says.
“Oh, this isn’t a project. I’m just creating an example of how if/then loops work for Nursey.”
“Why?”
Dex shrugs. “To be honest, I don’t really know.”
“You haven’t even assigned pizza a value. Or subject.”
subject = None
pizza = “don’t worry be happy. yay pizza”
love = random.randint(0,1)
poem = “here is the poem. ”
easy = 1
iff love == easy
subject = pizza
print(poem + pizza)
else
subject = love
print(poem + love)
“I don’t actually need subject, do I? No, I don’t.”
“Happy to help. Also, I like your pizza poem.”
“Thanks. It’s a work of art. Besides, it’s not like anyone’s gonna see it besides us anyway.”
pizza = “don’t worry be happy. yay pizza”
love = random.randint(0,1)
poem = “here is the poem. ”
easy = 1
iff love == easy
print(poem + pizza)
else
print(poem + love)
“That implies a fifty-fifty chance that love will be easy and I don’t think that’s realistic.”
“True.”
pizza = “don’t worry be happy. yay pizza”
love = random.randint(0,100000000000000)
poem = “here is the poem. ”
easy = 100000000000000
if love == easy
print(poem + pizza)
else
print(poem + love)
“There, that’s nice and realistic.”
“I can’t tell if that’s optimistic or not. I wasn’t counting how many zeroes I put in.”
if love was easy, we would be
writing poems about better things
like pizza.
if pizza, then happy.
that’s all.
(Over the years, Nursey has learned that it’s better to have a short poem than to try to force words he doesn’t care about.)
His phone buzzes with a text from Dex. hey come to the haus i have something to show u
He replies, pillow fort??? :D, because why not, and closes his notebook.
Dex can tell when Nursey opens the door because the first thing he says is, “No pillow fort?”
“Nah. I wrote you some code.” He tilts his laptop screen towards Nursey, who reads it with a mild expression of confusion on his face.
“What does it do?”
“It figures out whether love is easy or not, and if it is, it writes a poem about pizza.”
“Chill. Does it work?”
“I think so, I tested it a couple of times. We can try it.”
Dex runs the code and both of them look at the computer screen, although Dex is mostly curious to see which number is equivalent to love this time, since the likelihood of—
“ Bro,” Nursey says.
here is the poem. don’t worry be happy. yay pizza
“Wow,” Dex says.
“Wow,” Nursey echoes. “What were the chances of that happening?”
“I don’t even know, I just hit ‘zero’ until it looked long enough, then copied and pasted it to set it as ‘easy’.”
Nursey turns in the poem, but if he takes his notebook out again later and adds ‘ here is the poem. don’t worry be happy. yay pizza’ at the end, well... nobody needs to know.
(Dex knows, though, because they thought of that together when they were getting pizza. It fits the theme. Elision, plain language, mundane subject. He gives a copy of the poem to Dex, too, to commemorate his foray into computer-produced poetry, and Dex smiles in a way that makes Nursey think the poem will outlast Dex’s ruthless tidying and spring cleaning. So they’ll see what happens. But first they’re building a pillow fort.)