Spent two hours job searching on-line for government jobs.

I spent about two hours exploring various government departments and agencies looking at job openings. I got very frustrated with it all. I need a private employer job search strategy. I have been passing my CV around to young people for comment. No reason to discount youth and their opinions.

I am deciding with my dad's help that grad school in statistics is not for me.

I am not sure of my chances of gaining entry to grad school in statistics. I stand a bettter chance in a legal studies MA program. I also might find the M.Sc. difficult going. Whereas I am doing quite well with legal studies consistently scoring B+ to A on courses. As such I may only study a legal studies course this winter and perhaps only one course. That course might be a feminist legal studies course or a course on sentencing.

I applied to some jobs on the place pro system at our school's career services.

I applied for some full time work through our school's career services place pro account/web system. I applied to be an ethical hacker amongst other jobs.

I read my old criminal law reform course personal journal on my iPod.

I tried out some software called Pod2Go. It did not work for weather. Pod2Go did work fine for lyrics, US stock prices and text notes. I also downloaded a manual for using notes on the iPod and formating them to work with iPod notes' html links to other notes on the iPod. I may teach myself more about how to use notes on the iPod. For now I tested a 56 Kb text file copy of my LAWS4305 course journal from Fall 2003. I read the whole journal on the iPod which was about 3 X 13 pages long.

I also studied one of our law professor's legal journal articles which is assigned reading in the feminist law course I might take this winter term on Thursday evenings. The professor and article are Majury, Diane. "The Charter, Equality Rights, and Women: Equivocation and Celebration" (2002) 40 Osgoode Hall L.J. 297-336.

I also listened to about the 4 most recent Wall Street journal podcasts. I should say most podcasts concern hi tech topics especially being Apple computer centric.

Job searching beginning.

I have begun to make a more serious job search for the end of my second undergraduate degree. In fact I will study less this coming year until possible grad school in the fall, so that I can search more and put more time into searching for a full time job.

I am reading US defence publications about the information age.

I got some books on eBay and am reading one book today. The book is

Alberts, David S. & Papp, Daniel S. Information Age Anthology Vol 1 : The Information and Communication Revolution (Washington, DC: The Centre for Advanced Concepts and Technologies, 1997).

Today I read the beginning and these two chapters:

Stewart, Thomas A. "Welcome to the Revolution" in Alberts, David S. & Papp, Daniel S. Information Age Anthology Vol 1 : The Information and Communication Revolution (Washington, DC: The Centre for Advanced Concepts and Technologies, 1997) at 7-26.

This article eplored the Toffler's three phaases of modern history, the agircultural revolution, the industrial revolution and the information revolution.

Alberts, David S. & Papp, Daniel S. & Tuyahov, Alissa. "Historical Impacts of Information Technologies: An Overview in Alberts, David S. & Papp, Daniel S. Information Age Anthology Vol 1 : The Information and Communication Revolution (Washington, DC: The Centre for Advanced Concepts and Technologies, 1997) at 27-82.

This article looked at three phases of history too, but all these three are termed information revolutions and then the first two of these three revolution's impacts are traced mostly on the USA and its society but also internationally. First the telegraph, the telephone, and radio are explored, described from a US centric point of view then impacts are described where there are impacts around the world on societies and governments but not so much on international actors. Then the second information revolution is described as the the facts of three technolgies, the television, the early computers and the global satellite communnication system.

I will be graduating this winter.

I have completed my legal studies BA requirments and will be graduating with high honours this winter. I have no more courses to study for my BA but will study some statistics this winter to upgrade my B.Math for possible graduate school. Also studying these statistics courses should be fun and a good lot of programming and number crunching.

Political economy studies

I read a little of the basics of globalization. This author then takes this into the local city politics sphere and finds we need to re think the globalization thesis. I learned about something called the new localism. Also the same sort of cities in competition for big business locations of workplaces was covered.

Now this blog is marked as spam blog.

My computer log book blog is no longer marked as a spam blog but now this study blog is so marked. I admit it must be boring and seem dreary to read my academic notes and certainly this blog can be dry but I am not selling anything here in fact this address
http://notebook.webpagex.org is a dot org meaning a non profit site. Oh well at least Blogger has improved the image verification system now for suspect spam blogs and I can still edit this blog after the initial post. This is like some kind of internet nightmare.

I am improving on my internet search documentation processes at the same time as reading articles.

I decided to study some literature references for a grant proposal that our self help group submitted to a foundation. We won the grant along with our hospital partner. I believe it was really the hospital that submitted the grant proposal. Our executive officer sent board members the project proposal files and I opened and read the lietrature reference pages. I then searched out a few articles at the school library. I started to read one article this morning.

The first open member/public meeting for our project is an info meeting tomorrow and today I have started to read one of the references/articles about a psychological scale that measures hope.

I did this search on google for the phrase “dispositional approach to measures” after reading Snyder, C.R., Sympson, S.C., Ybasco, F.C., Borders, T.F., Babyak, M.A., & Higgins, R., L. (1996). “Development and validation of the State Hope Scale.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2, 321-335. They use this phrase at 321 para 3 to describe part of their method. I needed to learn what is meant by dispositional.

I learned dispositional means inner person. In fact dispositional is like the word “traits” and is the view that includes internal personality characteristics, and further, is about internal reality or thought processes thus part of the “self”. Clique for understanding from my own language would be: “One's position on the matter”; One's disposition"; or legallly speaking "One's disposition submitted to the court. Differs from supposition and opposition.

The top three search results point to the same journal as the search term was taken from. Other search results show that making scales for stress, and satisfaction( in employment) and ability to think about symbols are all approached from dispositional approaches. Also the search got confused by the word "approach" being used as a trait, in the measure, rather than a methodological term which was the original context. But even approach/avoidance can be looked at from a dispositional perspective. The original context used approach to describe the method of constructing the Hope scale.

The learning I got out of this was less about psychiatry and more about how to document a google search. I copied and pasted the top ten search results into a word doc using Neo Office. I then followed 9 of the links that were dot edu links or I also followed one dot net link that was a researcher's web site; the only dot com I looked at was the Wiley.com web link because Wiley are an academic publisher so should be good quality.

After visiting each link I copied and pasted descriptions and tables of contents, or I copied and pasted bibliographic cites, or downloaded pdf's and also book marked each link's web page. I did not actually copy any articles off the web in whole and the pdf's seemed to offered freely. Only one article now needs a further search at the school library but in the end I now understand what the original article was talking about in the 3rd paragraph and this was a methodological aspect to this paper, so was important from my prespective. I then made notes on what I did for the nine web pages or documents.

I am still reading the book Techno Feminism.

I am still reading the book Techno Feminism. I am now on this writer's critique of Haraway. I have been reading this book on the bus and the train on the way to proctoring exams mostly but also while Christmas holiday shopping.

The past few days I have only been really reading one book.

Over the past few days I have only been reading one book. I have been reading Wajcman, Judy. Techno Feminism (Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2004). I have been rereading sections of this book. It is a short book only about 130 smallish pages. It is also really just a critique of other writers who write about the Internet or feminism and technology. I have been in touch by email this past term with a legal studies professor Sheryl Hamilton and have started to read her Ph.D.. She writes about cyberspace and feminism. I have even now asked her by email if she would like to supervise my MA in legal studies and have asked another legal studies professor for his opinion on her as a potential supervisor and it was that she is a good person to work with.

I wouldn't write anything other than the simple truth about others on the net and certainly not just anyone. I would not want to risk a law suit for something I wrote on the internet.

I need to read some more combinatorics to prepare for winter studies and also start using statistics software again.

I need to put some more time into reading over the holidays. I had planned on reading some more combinatorics when my law exam was over but have been caught up in working as an exam proctor. The combinatorics book is to help me study experimental design this winter. I am also studying statistical computing this winter. These courses are both on Monday and Wednesday afternoons. I will have Thursday evenings and Tuesdays to work as a TA. This may be my last term working as a TA as I understand I will not be eligible to work as a TA in the statistics graduate school because my GPA is too low.

I read about the Canadian Uniform Crime(UCR) Reports in a book.

I read about the UCR in Canada and the newer UCRII in a book by Kevin Hagerty a criminologist. I also bought a book of Patti Smith lyrics. It is Patti Smith Complete: Lyrics, Notes, and Reflections.This book inspired a little bass playing and creating some original music on my bass.

I have a new home computer

I was able to buy one of the last Apple eMacs. It will take a while to set it all up but it is working tonight and I burnt some DVD's of my mail for back up. I have burnt two copies of these email backups and before burning the third and final copy, I am using the new eMac to do some blog entries and school work and will also reinstall texshop. I am now using Neo Office 1.2 alpha.

I am still working as a proctor

I have worked at four exams now. I will work at one today and then one tomorrow and have Sunday off. I will then work for four days next week. It is good work nice and quiet. It is also related to being a professor so is in line with my career plans. It does not pay well though.

I am working on exams.

I have worked at three exams now and this work is not bad. It does not pay well just minimum wage. I guess the university does not value the effort we put into the education process.

Completed my BA now.

I wrote my last exam in my last course required for my BA in legal studies. Legal studies are the study of law in its social context. I have wanted to study this subject since 1981 and have been formally taking the courses since 1998. I should graduate with high honours and will attend the spring 2006 graduation ceremony.

My crystalcomputing blog is still marked as a spam blog.

It is a bit of a pain to have my crystal computing blog marked as a spam blog. The word verfication system only works once then offers the same image with the same letters on an edit but will not allow an edit. Second time strikes out.

TA duties completed for another term.

It was Wednesday this week that I took the student's assignments in to the professor and also returned my textbook and other TA materials to the school of mathematics and statistics. I also took in my grad school application for the M.Sc. signed and completed. I also gave Neil Sargent my referee forms for the M.A. and the M.Sc.. I have only one more set of referee forms to deliver and that is for Dawn Moore. I also have to get working to complete the M.A.application.

Lectures #3 and #5

I got lecture #2 all watched and then lecture #3 and am almost done lecture #5. I am skipping lecture #4 for now. I have all the digital documents from the course open on my computer. Speaking of computers I am getting a new eMac computer in about a week.

Hostage situation and a fellow grad student's plea

This is about the Canadian's being held hostage in Iraq.

Public pressure seems to be working, and the deadline has been extended two extra days, from the original date of today, until this Saturday.  If a petition is going to work, it seems to have a good chance right now.  If you would like to sign, please go here and add your name:
 
http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/freethecpt 
 
Below is an article on the situation, and here is a link to Now Magazine, which has two articles by friends of Loney's,  Andrew Cash and Len Desroches:
 
http://www.nowtoronto.com/issues/current/news_story.php

I got lecture 2 started early this morning.

I got started with the review of lecture #2 this morning. I also got my grading done so my TA duties are completed for another term.

I briefly reviewed the second half of lecture 1.

I watched parts of the second half of lecture 1. I have now cued up lecture 2 and will start watching it momentarily. I will take copious notes on lecture 2. I will then watch lecture 3 Tuesday morning and then sleep.

Reviewing law course materials this week to prepare for Saturday's exam.

I started early this morning to work through all 12 lecture tapes for a third and final time. I watch lecture 1 up to the break this morning and made comprehensive notes. I will review the rest of lecture 1, tonight and start reviewing lecture 2 and see if I can get to lecture 3 before sleeping Tuesday morning. I also have to do marking for three Q's in my TA work for 70 students.

Getting my studies organised for next Saturday's exam.

I am getting my studies organised for next Saturday's exam. I reviewed the last lecture in the term tape a bit this morning. I will also do some readings this morning. I have a fair amount of other stuff to do too like household cleaning, groceries, and some carpentry. I also have to mark some papers today or tomorrow.

Marking continues

I marked all the minitab problems for the student's homework. I just need to mark their textbook problems now. I stayed up all night and made ice coffee in the blender. I am just needing to get this marking done by Monday. I am also reading Judy Wajcman's Technofeminism.

I am hitting the required reading book.

I read the course readings last night. I finished reading about Louis Riel from press clippings from the trial and the execution. The next case we look at in the course pack is Oka. I still have to read Henry David Thoreau's Civil Disobediance but have read some of this before. I believe Thoreau's disobediance was to not pay taxes to show his disapproval of the war with Mexico and war in general.