10.30.2018: One Lesson of Math - Unit 2 Practice Test
Today's soundtrack is Green Day: Dookie. This evening, I'm doing the Unit 2 practice test in preparation for the unit test that I'll be taking tomorrow evening. #GreenDay

10.29.2018: One Lesson of Math - Unit 2 Review
Today's soundtrack is Warlord: Warlord, this Christian hardcore band's self-titled EP. This afternoon, I'm doing the unit review for this past unit of absolute values and radicals. This unit was a big one; it covered the following topics: Absolute Value Simplifying Radical Expressions Adding and Subtracting Radical Expressions Multiplying and Dividing Radical Expressions Solving Linear Equations Involving Radicals #Warlord

10.28.2018: One Lesson of Math - Solving Radical Equations
Today's soundtrack is Dissection: Storm of the Light's Bane/Where Dead Angels Lie, a classic black metal album. This morning, I'm putting together the past few lessons about radicals - absolute value, simplifying radical expressions, adding and subtracting radical expressions, and multiplying and dividing radical expressions - and now I'm learning how to solve radical linear equations. Important note: if our solution to a linear equation does not fit within the variable's po

10.27.2018: One Lesson of Math
Today's soundtrack is Rag'n'Bone Man: Human, a cool hipster neo-soul album that my friend Richard introduced me to. It's great music with gorgeous, passionate vocals. This afternoon, I'm continuing to work on the assignment portion of the lesson about multiplying and dividing radicals. This part of the lesson covers multiplying radicals with variables, which requires identifying the value of which each variable is defined before using distributive properties to multiply the e

10.26.2018: One Lesson of Math
Today's soundtrack is Telegraph: Mir, a gorgeous 70s-style prog rock album from this Israeli band that sounds like the perfect mixture between Camel, Wishbone Ash, Porcupine Tree, and Yes. I adore this album; I'll definitely be adding it to my personal playlist. I made some more headway on my math assignment. It's slow going, but I'm getting there; I'm now halfway through the questions. I'm getting more comfortable with expanding and simplifying polynomials that include radic

10.25.2018: One Lesson of Math
Today's soundtrack is Death Grips: Year of the Snitch, an album that's really out there. It's trippy like CLPPNG, but with more synths. This evening, I'm working on the assignment portion of the math lesson about multiplying and dividing radical expressions. #DeathGrips

10.24.2018: One Lesson of Math - Multiplying and Dividing Radical Expressions
Today's soundtrack is Kraftwerk: Autobahn, an utterly mesmerizing synth-driven ode to driving. This afternoon, I am learning about multiplying and dividing radical expressions. When multiplying a binomial expression including radicals, we use two properties: the distributive property and the multiplication property of radicals. When multiplying a binomial expression which includes variable radicands, we first identify the values of the variables, then expand, simplify, and so

10.23.2018: 30 Minutes of Songwriting
Today's soundtrack is Jefferson Airplane: Surrealistic Pillow. I want to delve further into the world of synthesizers. After recreating the Twin Peaks soundtrack with Reaper's built-in synthesizers, I've decided to try to learn more about modular synths. I'm starting with the Caustic "Subsynth" tutorial. The synth is named "Subsynth" not because it will blast out your subwoofers, but because it is a subtractive synth - meaning you start with a full sound, then sculpt the soun

10.22.2018: One Lesson of Math - Adding and Subtracting Radical Expressions
Today's soundtrack is God is an Astronaut: Epitaph, an instrumental album that is beautifully atmospheric and so inspiring. It could be the soundtrack to a movie. It reminds me of a perfectly-executed fusion between Agalloch and Sigur Rós. This afternoon, I'm learning about adding and subtracting radical expressions. We can simplify radical expressions in the same way that we simplify polynomials. We consider expressions with the same radicand and same index to be alike. - √3

10.21.2018: One Chapter of Nonfiction
Today's soundtrack is Judas Priest: FIREPOWER. This afternoon, I'm reading the second chapter of Mark Vernon's book Plato's Podcasts, "Sappho and the Art of Paying Attention." Curiosity is an essential trait for man. Without it, we would not search for meaning. Without curiosity, we lose our motivation to live, but "to be curious about things is to cultivate a zest for life" (p. 10). Vernon points out that a healthy balance is essential in our curiosity. Too much, and we turn

10.20.2018: One Lesson of Math
Today's soundtrack is Converge: The Dusk in Us, an incredibly passionate melodic hardcore album. The intro to "Reptilian" is epic; it sounds like something from Nile's heyday. This afternoon, I'm doing the assignment that accompanies the lesson I recently did on simplifying radical expressions. #Converge

10.19.2018: One Lesson of Coding
Today's soundtrack is Eminem: Kamikaze. I completed the TXT2MIDI program today; the details have been merged with yesterday's post (October 18, 2018). #Eminem

10.18.2018: Special Edition - TXT2MIDI.py
Today's soundtrack is Rest, Repose: Rest, Repose, the self-titled album from this band that features one of my favourite YouTubers, "Djent Daddy" Jared Dines. The guy is genuinely funny and is an incredible guitarist, drummer, and vocalist. This afternoon's songwriting project isn't strictly featuring the writing of any songs. Actually, it's probably more about coding than it is about songwriting. But I had an idea that I want to try out: I want to build a Python program that

10.17.2018: Handwriting One Poem
Today's soundtrack is Emmure: Eternal Enemies. If Emmure was a car, it would be a Ford Edge. These guys sound like an angsty bro country band playing metalcore. Their snare was washed out in reverb, the whole mix was overcompressed and literally hurt to listen to, and the guitars were basically just downtuned chugs the whole way through. Even the songwriting felt really lacking. They had alternating call/response sections where one singer said some words and then another guy

10.16.2018: Special Edition - Playing the "Twin Peaks" Theme Song Entirely On Reaper's
Today's soundtrack is Dropout Kings: Audiodope, an awesome heavy album that sounds like a sort of millennial nu-metal: like Korn and Linkin Park meet Drake or some trap music. Really cool stuff! One of my favourite shows of all time is Twin Peaks. An integral part of the Twin Peaks experience is the beautiful soundtrack. I decided to combine two interests of mine: one, to do a cover of the show's theme song; two, to see just how much I could get out of the Reaper's built-in s
