Codecademy offers a 7 day trial period and I immediately started the Python 10 hour course.  The platform is useful and consists of three panes: instructions and examples, script editor, and the console showing the results of the script.

Within an hour or so, I was able to write a short Mad Libs script, which worked in the Codecademy console:

"""
This program generates passages that are generated in a cool mad-lib format
Author: Johan
"""

# The template for the story is below

STORY = "This morning %s woke up feeling %s. 'It is going to be a %s day!' Outside, a bunch of %s were protesting to keep %s in stores. They began to %s to the rhythm of the %s, which made all the %ss very %s. Concerned, %s texted %s, who flew %s to %s and dropped %s in a puddle of frozen %s. %s woke up in the year %s, in a world where %ss ruled the world."

print "Mad Libs has started!"

name = raw_input("Enter a Name: ")
adj1 = raw_input("Enter an adjective: ")
adj2 = raw_input("Enter a second adjective: ")
adj3 = raw_input("Enter a third adjective: ")

verb = raw_input("Enter a verb: ")

noun1 = raw_input("Enter a noun: ")
noun2 = raw_input("Enter another noun: ")

animal = raw_input("Enter an animal: ")
food = raw_input("Enter a food: ")
fruit = raw_input ("Enter a fruit: ")
superhero = raw_input ("Enter a superhero: ")
country = raw_input ("Enter a country: ")
dessert = raw_input ("Enter a dessert: ")
year = raw_input ("Enter a year: ")

print STORY % (name, adj1, adj2, animal, food, verb, noun1, fruit, adj3, name, superhero, name, country, name, dessert, name, year, noun2)

I wanted to save the code in a console so that people could run it.  I created this Kaggle kernel (open only on desktop).  Kaggle is a site where you can store and run your code and share with others.  However, when I ran it I got an error.  Turns out Kaggle runs Python 3 and the Codecademy course is teaching me Python 2…

Note to self (and you all): decide if you need Python 2 or 3.  Considering I’m expecting to do a lot in Kaggle, I think I need Python 3.  Back to finding an appropriate Python course.