Duke and Comp Sci
adapted from Don McLean's "American Pie"

A short, short time ago...
I can still remember
Just how emacs used to make me smile.
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could code the hamster dance
And maybe I could get it to compile.

But January made me shiver
With every day off I'd consider
Pointers and recursion
And ola's vector version.

I can't remember if I cried
When I looked through all his syllabi,
But something touched me deep inside
The day I took comp sci.

So bye-bye, recreational time.
Spend your evenings in the cluster
Till four-thirty or five.
While your fingers bleed and you code till you cry,
Hopin', "This'll be the time it compiles."
"This'll be the time it compiles."

Did you read the Sedgewick text,
And do you have faith in CPS,
If the handouts tell you so?
Did hashing tables make you glow,
Can pointers save your mortal soul,
And can you teach me how to find Big-Oh?

Well, I know that you're enjoyin' it
'Cause I've seen you smilin' while you sit.
You just kick off your shoes
While you read those F-A-Qs.

I was a stranger once to C++
With a universal serial bus.
My GPA, it made a fuss
The day I took comp sci.

I started singin',
"Bye-bye, recreational time."
Spend my evenings in the cluster
Till four-thirty or five.
While my fingers bleed and I code till I cry,
Hopin', "This'll be the time it compiles."
"This'll be the time it compiles."

Now for four months we've been on our own
And it's almost time to be headin' home,
But not till after finals week.
While ola sings on ADTs,
In the Gay Love Aud of LSRC,
Practice graphs and look through balanced trees.

Oh, but if the prof were out of town,
The TA'd steal his Dartmouth crown.
The lecture'd be adjourned;
No students would return.
But while ola switched transparencies,
The students flipped through Tapestry,
Thinking back to RSG
And the day they took comp sci.

We were singing,
"Bye-bye, recreational time."
Spend our evenings in the cluster
Till four-thirty or five.
While our fingers bleed and we code till we cry,
Hopin', "This'll be the time it compiles."
"This'll be the time it compiles."

Helper functions, private data members.
So many sorts for me to remember.
Oooh, my grade is falling fast.
I only hope I can pass.
Oh, how I'd love to get through this class.
This semester hasn't gone by very fast.

Now the spring-break air was sweet perfume
While the radio played that "Thong Song" tune.
We all got up to dance,
Oh, but we never got the chance!
'Cause the memories of tpqueue
And algorithms made us blue.
Are you certain how you feel 'bout
The day you took comp sci?

We started singing,
"Bye-bye, recreational time."
Spend our evenings in the cluster
Till four-thirty or five.
While our fingers bleed and we code till we cry,
Hopin', "This'll be the time it compiles."
"This'll be the time it compiles."

Oh, and there we were all in one place,
A second midterm left to ace.
And no more will to code again.
So come on: Sort be bubble, sort be quick!
Memorize those T-n tricks
'Cause compression is Huffman's only friend.

Oh, and as I turned that midterm page,
I clutched my pen in a fist of rage.
I wanted to do well,
To break my slumping spell.
But as the clock's hands whirred on to the right,
I struggled in a losing fight.
I saw ola laughing with delight
At the day I took comp sci.

He was singing,
"Bye-bye, recreational time."
Spend your evenings in the cluster
Till four-thirty or five.
While your fingers bleed and you code till you cry,
Hopin', "This'll be the time it compiles."
"This'll be the time it compiles."

I met a girl who posted news.
She asked the next course she should choose.
But I just smile and turn away.
I went down to the registrar
To tell them, "This has gone too far."
But the man there said withdrawal was too late.

And on the quad, the students screamed,
Professors cried; employees dreamed.
But not a word was spoken;
The Chapel bells were broken.
And the two men I admire most:
Astrachan and Turing's ghost,
They caught the last train for the coast
The day I took comp sci.

And they were singing,
"Bye-bye, recreational time."
Spend your evenings in the cluster
Till four-thirty or five.
While your fingers bleed and you code till you cry,
Hopin', "This'll be the time it compiles."
"This'll be the time it compiles."

And they were singing,
"Bye-bye, recreational time."
Spend your evenings in the cluster
Till four-thirty or five.
While your fingers bleed and you code till you cry,
Hopin', "This'll be the time it compiles."