This was how my lab master greeted me as he charged into the lab (he really only charges into anywhere. Not walks, not even boldly strides - charges) last Thursday. I looked up from my peaceful (read: mindlessly repetitive) work scoring behavioral task responses (I work in a psych lab...have I mentioned that?) to hear exactly what nonsense he was spouting. As it turns out, Lil Wayne, in his incredible ingenuity, has taken the lyrics of some random old song ("I'm just a soul whose intentions are good, oh Lord please don't let me be misunderstood" - I'll let you try to figure out how the meter works on that one, I still don't get it) and infused them into some rap. I dutifully listened to the proffered sample, and when it was over mumbled something vaguely complimentary and happily wiggled my earbuds back into place. And that's when my ears were filled with musical genius, thanks to that wonderful wonderful invention fondly known as Pandora.
If you've never used Pandora, I'm just going to come out and say it: your life is not complete. No, really, it isn't. I'm going to assume you at least know what it is (if not, where exactly have you been for the past like five years?) and not take the time to explain it to you. I was totally skeptical when I started using Pandora. You can't just tell me what kind of music I like. Music can't be quantified. Stupid computer program. Well, false. Pandora, upon input of one of my favorite artists, can completely recreate a good 60% of my iTunes library (the other 40% being the stuff I don't actually listen to), and then throw music at me that I don't understand how I've never heard of because it's so awesome. I've found the key is to not use the Like/Dislike buttons too frequently, or else it gets really niche-ified and not as good. Also it sometimes goes way off track, like the time last week it decided I would really enjoy Paul McCartney live. Over and over and over again. A few emphatic thumbs-downs did the trick. But in general it's awesome. Favorite station right now is based on the song "The Show" by Lenka - it comes out on the chill/artsy end of my spectrum of musical tolerance and I like it a lot.
So. Although I retain the opinion that computers can never be truly intelligent (a topic for another day), this particular computing system has musical genius down to a science. (It hopefully goes without saying that Lil Wayne, in this blogger's own humble opinion, definitively does not.)
In other news, I successfully applied for a senior honor society this week. (Successfully meaning I finished the application, not I got in. I even turned the application in a whole 8 minutes early. Yeah, that's right.) My proofreaders deemed my eye-roll-inducingly cheesy essays sufficient, so I sent them in and crossed my fingers. Fingers still crossed. I think I find out sometime next week. The people-pleasing side of me wants to be accepted primarily for the fact that it would make my parents really proud. The legitimate side of me is ridonculously excited about the prospect of going to local libraries and promoting literacy to children (read: reading to them, I think). So, I just really hope I get in.
In other other news, I finally found out that I passed all my Edinburgh classes!! Some more emphatically than others, so to speak, but all perfectly passed. That really kind of wraps it up for Edinburgh, which feels weird. I really, really miss it. Every time I think about it I come back to how happy I am to be home again. Also, it sort of feels like it didn't really happen. But I still miss it.
High of the day: chilling with the grad students in my lab discussing the possibility of getting a lab Settlers of Catan game. It was unanimously determined that that needs to happen ASAP. Also, I'm now officially a Children's Studies minor. :D
Low of the day: not realizing that it was supposed to
<3
This will probably sound really nerdy, but does Pandora have classical as well?
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of emphatically passing a class. You'll have to tell me how exactly one does this