Foil Memes

The mathematical tragedy of Tom and Jerry strikes again! Poor Tom thought he was being clever with (a+b)², only to get absolutely flattened by the reality that it equals a² + 2ab + b². That missing "+b²" term is the silent killer of algebra students everywhere. The binomial expansion waits for no cat, and those cross-terms will get you every single time. Twenty years of teaching and I still see this mistake on exams. Pro tip: FOIL isn't just a kitchen wrap—it's what keeps you from becoming a mathematical pancake.