Once, after a long coding session in college, our group's minds started to wander on a few weird tangents. Ok, computer folks get on weird tangents all the time...but well...this was sleep deprivation. I'll skip the illicit conversations and go right to the ones more relevant to this forum :)

We were postulating the idea for a game show called "Write That Code". Essentially, "Name That Tune", but with Software. If you've never seen "Name That Tune", it's a game show where players wager they can name a song in a particular category in a certain number of notes. Eventually, some one will wager something absurd, like "I can name that Polka song in the first three notes", and the other contestant will balk and exclaim "Then NAME THAT TUNE!!!". Do you know "In A Gadda Da Vida" from the first few notes? I do. But not Polka. The skill exhibited from some of the tune naming is really bizarre. Well, "Write That Code" might go something like this:

Host: Steve and Suzanne, the coding problem is to determine who is winning the most democratic primaries in the U.S.

Steve: I can do it in 100 lines.

Suzanne: I can do it in 65 lines.

Steve: I don't believe you. Suzanne, WRITE THAT CODE!!!

At the time, I knew Perl, but I had not yet embraced it as the Holy Grail. Now, I know the choice language for "WRITE THAT CODE!" that fictional game show we invented one night spent too late working on that Senior Project. Thank you Perl, for making me feel like I can do anything. For, really, with the right expenditure of effort...it's all doable.

Thought I would share that story in case anyone needed any good Perl ammunition in the workplace, or if they just wanted to reflect on why Perl kicks so much butt. I dare you...sometime...though this was a story, to try and consider what "write that code" would be like in different languages. It's an eye opener to how good we have it with Perl.

(And, for those that ask, device driver programming for GNU Hurd does not get brought up much on "Write That Code". Occasionally, perhaps, for the Tournament of Champions!)

For what it's worth, of my fellow coders -- I went off to IBM (for a while), one of the guys to Lockheed, the other to Microsoft. If any of you are out there, you don't know Perl, and I now own your silly game :)