I took back to the library two medical books. Both were doctors handbooks on drugs. One book was describing the consequences of alcohol and drugs of abuse. The other book described the plants and uses and affects of herbal psychoactives.

It took about half an hour to grade the first page of the assignment for STAT2507 so it took the budgeted time no problem. I have about 45 minutes left to grade this assigment. I should be finished with this today or Monday morning. I reviewed a little of the STAT2507 textbook.

I wrote a summary of the Becker reading, eludicating a statistical view and interjecting my comments, on how well Becker does with what he is trying to do. I feel he does a good job of it but should have used a wider moral compass.

I read more of chapter three of Hacker Culture in particular I read about the battle between Microsoft and the cdc.

I have started to write my final copy of my reaction paper to Howard Becker's the Outsiders. It should be fairly easy I just need to read the chapter we are concerned about again and then write a page or two about this.

I have to grade some assignments today for a basic statistics course.

I should also start to work on the numerical analysis course assignment #4. I scored well on the third assignment so could still get a reasonable mark in this course. I am tempted to study the fourth year numerical linear alagebra course in the winter term.

I am finished delivering the Saturday paper to my neighbourhood. When I got in I of course first made coffee. Then I felt I was behind in LAWS4908 so started chapter three of Hacker Culture. It was in the beginning of this chapter that I found a reason for hacking as a crime. I paraphrased that and began to gather the sections of the paper into a rough draft. I have appoximately 13 pages now for that paper.

Based on the rewriting I was doing and minor editing I am going to investigate cvs software for word processing.

I am rewriting my term paper in LAWS4306 after some feedback from the professor, Doctor Dawn Moore. I have some reading to do for this week but have the Becker read two months ago for this week. I have to write a reaction paper on Becker and hand it in this week on Tuesday.

I have read the Canadian Information Processing Society (CIPS) Code of Ethics and Standards from Berleur, Jacques & Brunnstein, Klaus eds. Ethics of Computing: Codes, Spaces for Discussion and Law (London: Chapman & Hall, 1996) at 79-83 and the Comments on the CIPS Code of Ethics and Standards of Conduct by Diane Whitehouse just after in the same book at 83-86. This was for LAWS4908.

I did a tutorial in MATLAB and curve fitting using least squares yesterday at school in the fourth floor math and statistics school's computer lab. I did it perfectly after a fair amount of help from another students class notes on the linear systems for solution and the TA helping remind me of logs.

I tutored a student in limits from the calculus course MATH1002.

I am just getting ready to help deliver the Ottawa Citizen. I read the last three days newspapers late Friday night with some friends. About an hour ago I read articles about the iPod musical device in the Tech Weekly section. I of course just had to surf www.apple.ca to check out the new iPod photo and also the U2 iPod. I updated my iTunes too and updated my .net on the my laptop.

I read the beginning of this article tonight concerning acts needed to define a crime. The author suggests control is what is needed not an act. Husak, Douglas Does Criminal Liability Require an Act? in Duff, Antony Philosophy and the Criminal Law: Principle and Critique (Cambridge,U.K.: Cambridge, 1998). I read this just after writing about laws relationship to three school of ethics, Kantian, Consequentialist and Relativist.

I read this article this weekend: McCollister, Kathryn E. & French, Michael T. The Economic Cost of Substance-Abuse Treatment in Criminal Justice Settings in Leukefeld, Carl G. Tims Frank & Farabee, David. eds. Treatment of Drug Offenders: Policy and Isssues (New York: Springer, 2002). This completes my reading of the first section of this book. The first section is called Background.

I read more of Hacker Culture the past few days and am almost finished the second chapter now called Hacking as the Performance of Technology.

I spent about 5 hours so far on assignment #3. This is more than I could put in for assignments #2 & #1. I did put in about 3 hours on assignment #2 maybe more. I don't remember how much I put into assignment #1. This means I am doing about a 1/1 out of class in class ratio and I need to pick this up a bit in this course.

With the present assignment, #3 I should be able to hand it in and not have to do any MATLAB work in the lab tomorrow. Nor will I have to ask the professor, Dave, if I have it right. I know I have done it well and right. I have the good copy of Q.1 and Q.3 done and just need to proof read them now. I have only to do a final copy of Q.2 and I am done. It is almost 4 am now. I will sleep at 5 am at the latest and do the final write up of Q.2 in the lab tomorrow if I have too.

I have some hard copy of my legal studies writing done for the tutor tomorrow. I will be at school from 1:00 PM to about 7:00 PM. I also need to find more time for my legal studies courses. I did read the first two chapters in a drug treatment policy book: Leukefeld, Carl G. Tims Frank & Farabee, David. Treatment of Drug Offenders: Policy and Isssues (New York: Springer, 2002) this morning too. They were:

Leukefeld, Carl G. Farabee, David & Tims Frank. Clinical and Policy Opportunities at 3-8.

This chapter explored the basic issues of drug treatment policy in prisons.

Filed, Gary D. Historical Trends of Drug Treatment in the Criminal Justice System. at 9-21.

This gave an alternate view of drug control history but also deepened my knowledge of the history of drug control by offering a history of drug treatment as it is in prisons. It also touched on drug enforcement because of course those arrested may end up in prison or being treated for addictions.

I am hoping this book will help with my term paper.

I did not do a really great job in the lab duties yesterday but all the students were doing their work fine and I solved a few problems and covered some basic concepts about cumulative probabililty and probability density functions. Basically they learned P(a < x < b) and getting their questions into that form and they learned P(a) = 1 - P(a (not)). I also did not give the students any answers and reminded them to use thier books. They have a mid term tonight that I will help a little with as a proctor. For this work I will be spending 30$ US to rent a copy of Minitab 14 for five months.

I solved the algorithum for the tridiagonal system at school yesterday, while sitting on a bench. Then I went to the lab and got it to work and made a jpg of the plot and printed it last night when I got home. Just now minutes after midnight, I put the algorithum down in pen and ink in rough form and as I did it computed the computational complexity. It can be solved in 7N -5 operations. I also solved Q.1 in the assignment # 3 for MATH3806 in rough form just now. I now just need to write up a discussion of my plots for Q.3 in rough form. Then I need to make a good copy of all this work. So I am in the home stretch now. This is all due tomorrow in the mid afternoon.

Also tomorrow afternoon I have an appointment with Loyd, a cognative studies graduate student who works at the writing tutorial service; who will help me with my legal studies writing. I got one paper back graded from my drug law course, so 20% of the grade has been earned to date.

With the assignment # 3 tomorrow submitted I will have completed 36% of the grade in MATH3806.

I got my MATLAB software ordered. I also got the MATLAB work done for this week's assignment #3 due tomorrow. I just need to do the pen and ink math now.

I was looking for pdf's on hacking to use on my palm for research for my law paper. I found this web site for pdf's http://pdf.textfiles.com/. I downloaded some articles on hacking including a book in German.

I made no mistakes yesterday in the labs. I worked for two hours. I debugged about 20 student's programs. I guess I am a talented programmer and can teach programming. I got the graded assignments back to the instructor.

I have a lab to give today and got the assignments all graded last night. Then for this course I have to proctor a test tomorrow. I will not have any grading in this course until next weekend.

I won't take any security work next weekend. I have a security shift this weekend.

I managed to work a night shift as a security guard AOK. It was very physically demanding and I stayed up about 6 extra hours for about a 26 hour day. I had to volunteer at our self help group and keep minutes of our meeting on my laptop. I managed to do some of that work. All this on Monday/Sunday night.

I got my grading done today and have one more assignment to grade for a different course. There are about 20 papers. I have three hours of labs to give starting this morning. I am also tutoring a student in differential equations tomorrow. He also has a disablity. Then on Friday I have to help proctor a test. Our role playing game is caneled tonight which gives me more time to grade papers. We should be able to have our cyberpunk role playing get together with other consumers on Friday.

I have a day shift this coming Sunday then no shifts scheduled in security.

Yesterday I attended all my classes and that went well. I got a fairly decent mark on my reaction paper. I also got some notes for a class I missed last week in numerical analysis. I got to work on the assignment more this week. I will be buying a copy of MATLAB so I can work at home more on the assignments.

I am under a fair amount of teaching assistant work pressure.

I finally just now reached a goal with my marking work. It was about four or five days since when I thought I could reach this point and when I did. I have a fair amount of marking still to do.

I gave a test to about 120 students last night. It was about 2 hours of work as a proctor or test faciliator. I read a little more of Hacker Culture and also started to the read Peele, Stanton. The Diseasing of America: Addiction Treatment Out of Control (Lexington, Mass.: Lexington, 1989). This book on addiction was recommended by Dawn Moore our drug law professor who is only the third legal studies professor I have had so far in my BA who is not a lawyer but she is a full time professor unlike the other two who were part-tme faculty.

I completed the MATLAB work today very quickly. My code was perfect the first time although this code in MATLAB gave a strange matrix using Gaussian Elimination. I had to show why there was a resulting error when this algorthum was used with a vander matrix. Every column of such a matrix is a power greater or lessor than the coloumn beside it. Thus over ten columns in our example the order of difference is on the order of greater than 10^9 which was the difference between the first and last rows. I still need to solve the assignment #3. My pen and ink math on the last assignmeent was perfect but I did not do enough MATLAB work on assignment #2.

I just called my wife's publisher to do the last minute details for the Small Press book fair tomorrow. He has paid for the table. We should be there at 11 am tomorrow morning but it is ok if we are a little late. I may leave my wife there and leave the fair early. It should be a good relaxing time though and social. I might be able to pick up some interesting books art or digital books or art. I should budget a little spending money for lunch too.

My school writing is coming along fine. I got about 6 pages written in the 60 page paper. This paper is on computer crime.

I have a lab to do today. I will be programming in MATLAB. I skipped out on meeting with the Minister today. I have to proctor a test tonight. I actually enjoy being at school late Friday nights. It is better than being drunk in a loud bar. I might end the evening after the test in the library. Our school library is open late. I should be reading some more books on drug laws. I think I'll post this now and search for some books on the library web site before going to school for the lab.

The concept of down time comes from computing I think. I did work yesterday for two hours. I gave some help to students in their scheduled lab times. I also worked on their review problems at a computer using Minitab and SAS. I also got some of my homework done using MATLAB. This morning I am going off to my lecture the 11 th lecture in my numerical analysis course. We are just finishing up linear systems. This lecture today should be the new stuff on iteration methods. I hope to work some more after class on the assignment for this course. Then I have to prepare for one hour for a lab I give later in the afternoon. I also have mobilization meeting at noon for our TA union. Then after the lab later in the day I have a wobbly union meeting. I should be able to get home at about 2 PM and rest and relax a bit before the late afternoon work.

Tomorrow morning I meet with the Minister of Citizenship to discuss the new Ontarian's with Disabilities Act. Then on Monday after my Sunday night shift I have a board meeting at our self help group.

I will also be selling books this weekend at a small press book fair on Saturday. Somewhere in all this time I have to find time to mark assignments too. Maybe I will skip the mobilization meeting at lunch and come home and mark.

I got one reaction paper written and handed in for Sheptycki's Issues in Transnational Policing. I had a little chat with my professor about my term paper and things went well in class yesterday as we discussed the drug/crime nexus.

I got some writing done on my fourth year paper and the supervisor was impressed and happy with it. I did though loose my watch while visiting him and must go buy a new watch today at a department store.

I also have attended my math course yesterday. It went well and we studied iterative solutions to linear systems. This is matrix math.

I need to work on grading papers this morning and then have two labs to give at 10:30 and 11:30 then I have the day off but will do more grading today.

This blog is one year old now. It should be two years old before I graduate with my second degree my BA in legal studies next November 2005.

I am doing great with LAWS4306B. I have a rough final draft of my first reaction paper done. I will just proof read it and create a little more logical structure then hand it in on Tuesday at the beginning of class.

I am doing poorly with MATH3806. I enjoy the lectures and the labs but the assignments are difficult. I read very little of the texbook yesterday but did read a little. I need to read more.

This is my bibliography to date for my LAWS4908 paper. I just sent via email this un anotated to my supervisor. I am now as I post it here making some notes on each reading.

Bibliography

Bachman, Ronet & Schutt, Russel K. The Practice of Research in Criminology and Criminal Justice 2nd Ed. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press, 2003).

I read the first few chapters of this book. It describes research methods in criminology. It is a huge textbook like work.

Behling, John H. Guidelines For Preparing The Research Proposal (New York: University Press of America, 1984).

I did not read much of this book.

Berleur, Jacques & Brunnstein, Klaus Eds. Ethics of Computing: codes, spaces for Discussion and Law (London: Chapman & Hall, 1996).

I have browsed this book before. It is more or less professional ethics for computer scientists and came up or from another course, PHIL2104. This maybe useful for some detail in looking at programmers as ethical rather than criminal.

Bogard, William. The Simulation of Surveillance: Hypercontrol in Telematic Societies (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University, 1996).

This book just looks cool and is a joining of the philosophical topics of Foucault' surveillance and Baudrillard's simulation. I started to read this book too. It may prove to be useless for this paper.

Brock, Gerald W. The Second Information Revolution (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University, 2003).

This may also prove to be quite useless. It is a history in economic terms of telecommmunications and then the information age.

Davis, Robert W.K. & Hutchinson, Scott C. Computer Crime in Canada: An
Introduction to Technological Crime and Related Legal Issues (Toronto,
Ont.: Carswell, 1997).

This book maybe useful and it seems quite structured to help me write my paper.

Duff, Antony. Ed. Philosophy and the Criminal Law: Principle and Critique (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University, 1998).

I have looked at this book a little and it maybe too in depth about side or unrelated topics.

Himanen, Pekka. The Hacker Ethic and the Spirit of the Information Age (New York: Random House, 2001).

This book helped me delimit my topic to not include hackers who create useful things and are not treated as criminals but as business men. It can be related to Thomas below.

Kowlaski, Melanie. Cyber-crime: Issues, Data Sources, and Feasibility of Collecting Police-reported Statistics, Cat. # 85-558-XIE, (Ottawa, ON:, Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, December 19, 2002).

This I haven't looked at this recently but has definitions as well as ways of measure for crime statistics based on these definitions. It counts criminal code charges for the end of the century and beginning of this century.

Law Commission of Canada. What is a Crime? Challenges and Alternatives (Ottawa, LCC, 2003). (Cited September 26, 2004)

This was/is recommended reading by my superivsor. I like the suggestions of alternatives to the criminal law. This is where I will draw the relativistic notions surrounding criminal law applications to computer crime enforcment and punishment meaning sentencing.

Levi, Michael. "Between the risk and the reality falls the shadow": Evidence and urban legends in computer fraud ( with apologies to T.S. Eliot) in Wall, David S. Ed. Crime and the Internet (New York, Routledge, 2001).

This gave me a look at the hype behind computer crime and some idea of the law formation in the USA regards hackers.

Mawrey, Richard B. & Salmon, Keith J. Computers and the Law (Oxford: BSP Professional, 1988).

This book will also prove useless as it is out of date and is really meant as a guide for businesses and other computer users to seeking legal advise and reducing legal costs of using computers. This might help for an industry view of computer crime but will take more integration with other works. I would also need to bring it up to today by finding other works to cover the periods between 1988 and now.

Sieber, Ulrich. Ed. Information Technology Crime: National Legislation,
Jus Informationis European Series on Information Law v 6 (Köln: Carl
Heymanns Verlag, 1994).

This book is highley useful and is the general book that guides me at present. It is the section on Canada that I find useful also this editor is quoted in other papers and books.

Sofaer, Abraham D. & Goodman, Seymour E. Eds. The Transnational Dimension of Cyber Crime and Terrorism (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution, 2001).

This books is fear mongering and also shows the big hype behind computer crime. It will be useful for getting at another side of my argument if my argument is computer crime is not a problem.

Thomas, Douglas. Hacker Culture (Minneapolis, Minn.: University of Minnesota, 2002).

This book is usefull too for the hacker section of my paper and is interesting for its backward looking view of the hacker underground and the press on hackers.

Wall, David S. Maintaining Order and Law on The Internet in Wall, David. Ed. Crime and The Internet (London: Routledge, 2001).

I read this paper today and it helps to define computer crime but really aims to catagorize the four law enforcement or policing bodies involved in regulating the Internet.

I have to write out some scenerios for computer crime and do a little legal analysis by next Tuesday. I have some reading to do for my drug law course. I am also writing some reaction papers based on the readings for this course in drug laws. I got one paper done in rough draft last night. I am seeing a writing tutor today in the mid afternoon to go over my writing for this course. I got some math done in pen and ink for my assignment #2 and got a start on the programming yesterday for that assignment. I need to comlplete it today.

I got all my grading done this past week on time. I have some papers to grade now for two weeks from now. I also gave all my labs successfully this week. I investigating getting Minitab 14 beyond its trial period, but will have to pay for that myself; the school won't pay for it.

I admited to a supervisor that I have procrastination but then she admitted she did too and that everyone seems to have it. My friends at the role playing game also said it was common. I have been reading for my computer crime course. I am up early again this morning for class. I am heading off to school in about an hour. I have some homework to do and a lab to give today. I am also meeting with my legal studies supervisor.

I continued to read a book on crisis intervention by non-professionals. I tend to see that the philosophy of this book protects the professional counseler. I feel these professionals should be looked at critically and we must reality test their advise and not follow them blindly. Doctors are only human too.

I got one assignment marked and the marks recorded for the first assignment of this terms teaching assistant work. I am done that much now. This was the first assignment I have completing marking this term. I am getting out of my funk and getting things done now. I am feeling good now and things will continue to progress. It is the end of the day I need to rest up for classes tomorrow.

I read some more about computer crime culture. I didn't read any drug law stuff today or last night. I did get started reading chapter one of one book I will read for my honours paper called Hacker Culture.

This morning I emailed my math professor who guided me towards a solution of some homework. I did some math typing in emails. Math has really changed with the advant of computers but this is the one math course where computers are to be used in particular MATLAB software. I may study some more of this work later on this afternoon. I have been awake about 17 hours now so might stop writing and figuring soon and only read for the rest of the day.

I completed my readings this morning for this week's LAWS4306B lecture. I am started on next week's readings. I emailed my math professor. I need to buy a home copy of MATLAB to do better in this course. I am studying mentoring relationships in one library book. I am also reading a scientific computing book I borrowed on Friday. I did some studies of computer crime statues in one of the books I am borrowing for lAW4908. I made two appoinments with the writing tutorial service at school for the next two Friday's.

In some ways, I am under more pressure this year than any other years. I have the heaviest course load I have had in 27 years. I also have a very heavy work load in my teaching duties. I think you could follow my progress here a little. You could see my world fall apart.

I have two months of classes to go this term. I have three papers to do in one course and an exam in that course. I have four more assignments and four more lab sessions and then an exam in my math course. And I have to write a draft paper on computer crime by the beginning of the January term.

I have completed 10% of my drug law course and started another 55%. I have started to complete everything but the exam. I have completed 12% of my math course. I have another 4% to do tomorrow and another 8% to complete by next Thursday.

Today I missed my class so I could stay up a little later last night and get a good sleep. I know my mother would say I made the right decision in that I got more sleep. I think I noticed it in my teaching assistant work today as I was able to give a slightly better lab.

I also felt and still feel more relaxed because I took some pressure and expectation off my plate. I have to be careful not to let these duties slide too much. But then perhaps I have taken on too much. I also missed volunteer training yet again tonight. When this happens I focus on the next event in my schedule and getting that done. So tomorrow I need to attend that lab.

I am behind on MATH3806. I plan to go into the lab early tomorrow morning to get some help with assignment #2. This assignment concerns the methods of finding roots to equations of the type f(x)=0. There are five methods we studied:

Fixed point

This method uses x(n)=g(x(n-1)) to make an iteration.

Bisector method

This method uses two points, one above the x-axis and one point below. So a necessary condition for this method is f(x(0))*f(x(1)) < 0. Then the next point in this iteration is chosen to be the mid point between the two points and then this point is checked to see if it is above or below the x-axis and this point is a new guess point with whichever of the first two points is opposite the x-axis to this new point. This iteration continues until the root point.

Floating Point method

This method also requires two points, one above the x-axis and one point below. So a necessary condition for this method is again that f(x(0))*f(x(1)) < 0. Then this method takes a line between the two points and where the line crosses the x axis is the next point, so it is also an iteration.

The secant method

This method draws a line between the two initial guess, x(0) and x(1) and then extends this line until it crosses the x-axis and make that point the third point then the new point and the nearest of the first two are the next two guess points.

Newton-Raphson Method

This method uses the first derivative at an intial guess x(0) and constructs a line from the point to the x axis using the first derivative as the slop of the line. Where this line crosses the x-axis is used to make the next guess. This method is taught in first year calculus typically.

I spent an hour typing this post and reviewing the section(2.1) in the textbook on the fixed point method. I need to read the rest of chapter 2 still and complete a MATLAB assignment on chapter 2. Tomorrow in the Lab we will be graded on the lab work we do. Next Thursday I have to hand in the assignment.

I am hoping to do some reading tonight of chapter two. I want to put in another hour tonight then go to the lab tomorrow. I will also spend some time tonight read books for my LAWS courses.

I am starting my term paper for LAWS4306B with this definition of addiction from the World Health Organization:

addiction, drug or alcohol: Repeated use of a psychoactive substance or substances, to the extent that the user (referred to as an addict) is periodically or chronically intoxicated, shows a compulsion to take the preferred substance (or substances), has great difficulty in voluntarily ceasing or modifying substance use, and exhibits determination to obtain psychoactive substances by almost any means.[Source, World Health Organization, <http://www.who.int/substance_abuse/terminology/who_lexicon/en/> (Cited, September 30, 2004).

I spent about an hour just now writing my first two pages.

I spent about half an hour marking and now I am emailing my supervisor and taking a break. I will mark some more on Friday morning then again Friday night/Saturday morning.

I am going to miss my numerical analysis course later today. Instead, I am staying up late from Thursday to catch up on homework. Also I will be getting more sleep and catching up on sleep too. For tomorrow I need to study partner assault and also prepare for giving a lab in STAT2507 at 16:30.

I just spent half an hour writing the beginning of all my written term work for LAWS4306B. I started both reaction papers by copying and pasting notes, from my blog on the readings these reaction papers react to , into open office extension doc files. I also wrote a little more of my outline for the term paper for this course and started the paper by copying and pasting some blog notes on an addictions culture book I read this summer.

I also hope to mark one section, the easyist section from the students STAT2606 assigment #1 this morning and take no more than one hour doing that if not only half an hour. I am just going to take a smoke break and then start that grading work.

I completed reading this week's readings for my LAWS4306B course on drug laws. I read a paper by Cathrine Carstairs on Chinese racism in making our drug laws more severe. This was in the Canadian Bulletin of Medical History and I needed to read it at the Morriset library at the University of Ottawa. I also borrowed a book on medical statistics and will be reading this book today.

I am reading Oliver-Smith, Anthony Theorizing Vulnerability in a Globilized World: A Political Ecological Perspective in Bankoff, Greg, Frerks, Georg & Hilhorst, Dorothea. Eds. Mapping Vulnerability: Disasters, Development & People (London: Earthscan, 2004) at 18. On this page there is an argument following explanation of ideological vulnerability concerning broadening semiotics to the context of politics and the economic. The arguments that Oliver-Smith points to are Gottdiener, M. Post-modern Semiotics: Material Culture and the Forms of Post-modern Life (Oxford, Blackwell, 1995) for a critique of the old school language is everything semiotics and Biersack, Aletta. 'Introduction: From the 'new ecology' to the new ecologies' [1999] American Anthropologist, 101(1): 5-18 for an argument to include the political and economic context of semiotic findings. I need to find these references now for my work on semiotics of the computer "how to press". Although I was reading this book as a follow up to a geography book on reactions to the terrorist attacks in September 2001, I found some ideas to continue my semiotics project. I note that my semiotics project did place the computer "how to press" in the human resources field (a business subfield and thus an economic fact), as a positive, and thus the semiotics scholars I had read in 2003 were already aware of this broader semiotics.

I completed reading chapter 6 in Campbell, Nancy. Using Women: Gender, Drug Policy and Social Justice (New York: Routledge, 2000) at 144-168. This shows me the issue of deflecting responibility to an individual level away from a social level. At least three male guitarists I have played with push this attitude blatently and with anger.

I spent about an hour writing my research proposal. I had gotten some help creating an outline this past week. I used the outline to do the research proposal. Also the supervisor is allowing me to use the first person singluar in the paper. He says this keeps the hidden open. I spent about 5 hours on this course this week.

I attended all lectures this past week. I also attended my labs and gave labs as a TA. I managed to volunteer in health care for about three hours. I also volunteered in my union for a couple of hours. I am also breaking the communication barriers with other TA's in my school where I should be a better functioning union steward.

I am slowed right down this past week on the drug law course. I did get approval to explore a couple of topics for my term paper in this course. I also tonight made some point form notes on how these two papers might go.

I got a math software lab back with a good mark. I did though hand in some so so work on my first assignment. It was not that bad but did not fully answer the questions. I did though learn a lot from the whole assignment including the context of modern math experimentation using computers. I use Minitab, SAS and MATLAB this week. I taught about 30 people to use SAS and about 20 people to use Minitab.

I have worked five and a half hours now at teaching assistant work this week. I gave three labs. In two of the labs I gave a talk prepared by the instructor. In the third one I made up a lab based on the textbook. In this lab students behaved very well. I used Minitab today for the first time. So I have been finally assigned and contract signed to STAT2507 and STAT2606. These are similar courses, STAT2507 is the general science introduction to statistics course and STAT2606 is the business introduction to statistics course. I have had both instructors as my teachers of statistics before and we seem to get along just fine.

Our TA union had its first general members meeting for the fall term. I kept minutes of the meeting on the union laptop.

I was able to make an outline for my honours paper and borrowed some more books on my topic and also on computer ethics. I am slowly plodding through the drug law reading for next week. I got most of my homework done for later today. I need to put some more effort into it. I am glad I have printer and photocopy money to use for this school work. I will be on campus today for about two hours

I also might have to go to the U of O campus today and use their library. I am about to sleep and then I may stay awake until Saturday and attend a University aboriginal community open house in the early afternoon on Saturday.

I led a discussion on drugs law history yesterday. This was the faciliation week I will be graded on. The students didn't seem to be too interested in my questions which asked them to compare the laws and law formation in 1908 and 1911 with today's marijuana law reform. The professor though thought they were good questions. I said that the medical marijuana debate was just this decades flavour for a reason to decriminalise. I also critiqued the race aspect of drug laws saying the real darkness was that drug smoking is dirty. I also said that the Victorian women alone drinking her opium was more likely to be alone, isolated and less social, than men talking worldly topics in a circle smoking opium. Well the drug law course is underway now. I also played a radio broadcast of Buck Rogers to get at sinophobia and passed around a printed comic from the Internet featuring Ming the Merciless a typical Chinese villian in Western culture and from Flash Gordon.

I have a very busy Wednesday today. I start my official lab duties in my teaching assistant work today. Right after that I have a meeting for three hours in the afternoon concerning mental health and the government. Then I come back to campus for a union meeting where I must keep minutes on a laptop. Then I can relax and play a role playing game with friends in the evening. Then I must sleep only five hours and wake up for Thursday's morning class. Then right after class I have an appointment with a writing tutor to help me write my fourth year honours paper. Then I have a few hours off until I have lab duties in the late afternoon. I still must meet with the professor of this lab to find out how he wants me to run the lab. I must remember to pick up another SAS license today too and find some time in the next two days to complete my MATLAB homework due early Friday afternoon.

I got the week's reading for LAWS4306B done on Sunday. I wrote my facilition questions last week and am still happy with them. I just now printed out a web page that worked out to 8 printed pages. The web page shows Ming the Merciless a Chinese villian from the Flash Gordon comic and movie. This is my cultural example of sinophobia for the class today. So I am on schedule for this course. I have two possible topics for a term paper for this course and have the approval of the professor to start working on these topics.

I have some questions now for my research proposal for LAWS4908 and have an appointment with my supervisor for tomorrow. I also have an appointment on Thursday with a writing tutor to help me write this proposal.

With all this law courses homework done I will now read some numerical analysis. We are working on the problem of finding roots in non-linear equations. I need to catch up a bit on reading the textbook on that problem.

I attended the first lab in another lab section for STAT2606, so that I could see how the professor gives the lab as she won't be available to give the lab in the section I have been assigned. She is going to leave me her lab instruction notes for me to give the lab on Wednesday. I have a very busy Wednesday but a fairly relaxed Thursday. Today I have a fairly busy day but after 14:30 I can come home and sleep.

I picked up two more books where chapters of these books must be read for certain week's of my drug law course. I have read some 55 pages of this week's reading with still 25 to go. I will read that tomorrow starting with the section on criminal code amendments in 1908 and 1911 as a result of the two opium acts.

Also today at school, I photocopied three journal articles for LAWS4306B. I have all but two of the reading now for this course. I started next week's readings but one reading next week is in a journal that is only at the University of Ottawa so I must travel over there to find it and photocopy it.

Also today at school I related some of the issues disabled students face in school to some learning assistants and tutors for their training. I did a one page hand out for them relating symptoms of mental illness with resulting problems in school. I met other successful disabled students also on the training panel.

I borrowed this book Behling, John H. Guidelines For Preparing The Research Proposal (New York: University Press of America, 1984), to help me write my research proposal for LAWS4908.

I got the first question of my first assignment for MATH3806 answered using Maple to make a copy I can hand in on a printed page. I might redo this with MATLAB this Sunday or Saturday. It took me about an hour. I have about 70 pages to read in the text book in two weeks now so about 2 or 3 pages a day. I haven't read anything since I last reported on this textbook.

I volunteered to be on a panel this weekend. The panel is part of the training for learning assistants in the Paul Menton centre, the disabled student's centre at Carleton University.

I have about 50 pages to read of Giffen, P.J., Endicott, Shirley & Lambert, Sylvia. Panic and Indifference: The Politics of Canada's Drug Laws (Ottawa,ON: Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse, 1991). Then I must prepare to faciliate a discussion for next Tuesday, of chapter 2 of that book. I should get this read by Monday so should read about 12 pages a day until Monday.

I have been super busy with school work. I have attended both my first classes now. So I have started the study of drug law and must facilitate a discussion in the class next Tuesday on the history of Canadian drug laws. I have attended now two lectures in my numercial analysis course and have begun to use MATLAB and write some of my first assignment due next Friday, not this Friday. But this Friday I will have an in lab assignment to do. I also have met to discuss my honours paper with my supervisor. I must now write a research proposal that defines the questions I hope to answer in my paper. My supervisor was telling me that asking the right questions is the most important part of doing research.

I have been trying to settle into working as a teaching assistant but my work schedule keeps changing and I can't be sure what classes I am working in yet. I have also been attending various union meetings and events and have a meeting tomorrow at noon. I might be staying awake until then.

I was in the past week reading, Piragoff, Donald, K. Canada: Computer Crimes and Other Crimes against Information Technology in Canada Sieber, Ulrich. Ed. Information Technology Crime: National Legislation, Jus Informationis European Series on Information Law v 6 (Köln: Carl Heymanns Verlag, 1994). This covers the Supreme Court hacking case in 1980 of R. v. McLaughlin [1980] 2.S.C.R. 331, so I was wrong that no hacking case had gone to the Supreme court yet. This case prompted the newer laws that eventually in 1985 covered hacking or unauthorised use of a computer in the Canadian Criminal Code. This was a brief look at the history of the hacking legislation. I also read some legal technicalities concerning defining the difference between data and information. I have a fair amount more of this paper to read still.

I read a little of 1.3 in my MATH3806 textbook and have ten pages left to read in this section and chapter 1. I should find time to solve the exercises in MATLAB and print out my answers at school. I also have chapter two to read in the next two weeks and chapter 2 is 60 pages long so I should read at a pace of two pages per day. I was able to work in pen and ink on problem #1 in the assignment #1 for this MATH3806 course and this assignment is due September 24th I think. I want to present my assignment as a word processed document and also we are required to print out our MATLAB m files and output. I have only about 1.5 more hours to work on this course planned until Tuesday's second class. If I go to school this afternoon I should try to print out some of my MATLAB work and practice.

I woke up tonight in the early evening and will stay up all night studying. In the morning I will attend a meeting concerning disAbilities on behalf of city hall. We are starting to look at next year's city budget. Also on Wednesday I have a meeting at city hall then that evening some volunteer tasks. I have classes on Tuesday and volunteer training on Tuesday night. I have the same thing Thursday and then have a lab on Friday then basically have the weekend off from work but can study then.

I bought a copy of a course pack by Woodside, Ann. Learning SAS Version 8 (Ottawa, ON: Carleton University, 2002). Ms. Woodside taught me ANOVA and is generally a supportive and friendly instructor in our school.

I cleaned up my office a fair amount. I am trying to get our third couch into my office and may do that tonight. This was I would have a nice comfortable place to study and place my books right beside myself. I have a couple of books on setting up home offices and can get some ideas from these books.

I did my usual lengthy emails and some short emails to professors. I bought a copy of Linux for Dummies Quick Reference. I also got a copy of the Computers of Star Trek. I took back the Data Mungling with Perl book and also the NAG library guide book that was almost 30 years old. I used the computers at school yesterday and used MATLAB for the first time to do some numerical analysis homework.

I got 2 hours done on that course, MATH3806, since Saturday morning and 3 hours done on law courses. I read more of the first week's readings for LAWS4306B and read more of Piragoff on computer crime law in Sieber's book for LAWS4908. Thus I have 2 more hours to put into MATH3806 before class on Tuesday, 3 more hours for LAWS4306B to complete reading the historical look at Canadian drug legislation and I would like to put in 6 more hours studying computer crime before I meet with my supervisor on Tuesday.

I have been hired again as a teaching assistant. This term I will be helping with MATH1004, Calculus for Engineering students and MATH2007 Elementary Calculus II. I gave a talk to some of the other TA's in the school about our union. Speaking of unions the support staff may have reached an agreement with the University now.

I read the first section of chapter 1 of Mathews, John H. & Fink Kurtis D. Numerical Methods Using MATLAB, 4th ed. (Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson, 2004). I started and am almost completed reading section 1.2. There are three pages left in 1.2 then 13 pages in 1.3 and I am done until Tuesday evening. I have put about 2 hours so far out of class time on this course, MATH3806. I would like to go to school today and start the use of MATLAB, but have a volunteer committment today too.

I already opted out of attendance at my volunteer committment this morning. I must attend this afternoon or wait for my certification exam. Also I have missed one session so far in sexual assault. The storm rains on Thursday have brought me down and I had a busy first week of school. I was able to volunteer with my unions this week.

I spent an hour last night studying for LAWS4306B. I should get another two hours done on that course today and another two tomorrow. This will just be reading and keeping notes on my blog here.

I want to spend about four hours or a little more on the MATH3806 course this weekend and on Monday. I need to try MATLAB this weekend. For that I need to check the lab schedule and see if the lab is open on the weekend.

I just checked the school of mathematics and statistics web site and the lab is open daily on the weekend. I can also take back some books to our school library today. I have about 20 books out but am not reading some of them. Some of these books are math books I borrowed to explore nunmerical analysis before the course, MATH3806 began.

I put in about an 2 hours this past week on LAWS4908. I need to put in about 12 hours a week on this course so should put in another 8 this weekend. So that is 16 hours I plan to study this weekend and Monday. I have no classes on Monday or Wednesday this week. I may or may not have a lab this coming Friday. Most likely we do have our first lab that day. I have classes on Tuesday and Thursday. I will also visit my LAWS4908 supervisor on Tuesday morning to start to discuss expectations and plan out the course and supervision of the paper.

I am slowly plodding through Manning, Peter K. Policing new social spaces, in Sheptycki, J.W.E. Ed. Issues in Transnational Policing (London: Routledge, 2000). This is a little dated and I think the potential in police computer systems is more actualised these days than when this paer was written in 2000. Also the high tech euphoria has come down a bit since then.

I bought copies of Watt, David & Fuerst, Michelle. The 2005 Annotated Tremeear's Criminal Code, student ed. (Toronto: Carswell, 2004) and McGill Law Journal. Canadian Guide to Uniform Legal Citation, 5th ed. (Toronto: Carswell, 2002). These two books are reference books.

I printed some lengthy 60 pages documents, two of them. One is an Ontario Appeals Court case concerning marijuana law, the other is a Law Commission of Canada(LCC) paper looking at what constitutes a crime. These papers are for my two law courses. The case is for the second last week of the drug law course. The LCC paper was suggeted to me by my supervisor for my honours paper. My course notebooks are prepared. I have spent about 5 hours on each courses now out of class study time.

Today is the first day of classes. I have been helping a bit with the TA union this week but I really need to help on Friday when I present the union to new math and statistic's TA's at the TA orientation session in the department.

I have gotten my textbooks purchased now. I read the review of calculus section in the numerical analysis textbook this morning and last night. I did start the practice exercises in that section. My first numerical analysis class is today. We have some 25 or 26 classes in this course. I have spent about 1 hour this week on that course. I have spent about two hours on that course previous to this week and during this past month. In the past I have tried to read some books on scientific computing and numerical analysis. I am ready to be at my class early this morning.

But before my class I will show some solidarity with the university support workers union and walk the info picket line with them. I will take some photos of the picket line. I am becoming a journalist with an article published this week and now more labour picket photos. The support union CUPE2424 have had the universities contributions to their pension fund reduced by the university. Our TA union is also in negotiations right now. We are still talking and seeing if we can work things out without a strike vote.

It is a dirty business buying school books. They are generally expensive. I compared prices at Amazon.ca and the school's book store and there is no difference except in softcover being available at Amazon. One fellow worker will have 300$ in books for one course. Another sister worker's daughter must pay 1600$ for books for one term in college. I suggested she shop at Chapters as that is what a college student friend does to save money. I am buying Canadian law books today. They are just a basic legal writing citation guide book and a Canadian Criminal Code book. All in all I will spend almost 300$ today to buy school books

I have some reactions to Becker's chapter four now. This chapter attempts and does a good job of describing group processes and sanctions concerning the use of marijuana. From a criminological perspective this maybe seen as morals, but in my view this is a limited view of morals. "A friend with weed is a friend indeed" suggests that supplying some one with weed is a good act. Do you see where I am going with this? I mean morals and ethics are about doing good deeds, only in criminology do morals mean acting in the approval of group values. This is, in fact, Becker's main point in this book Outsiders. He defines deviance via groups. Also, one defintion of law is that it supports social ordering, in other words behaviour is approved by group agreed values. Other readings in this course suggest this idea of law is falling apart in late modernity, but that's a side point here. Philosophy does not always need a group to suggest morals. Only really cultural relativism suggests groups have power over morals. Ok, maybe the Kantian universal is a socially derived ethic but the Kantian is better known as against the relative and setting absolutes for ethical behaviour. I think I want to look more at the consequential ethical view of crime.

In fact, marijuana dealing could be considered as it lies in ethical behaviour fully analysed. Does giving some one pot help them? What of other acts such as say, painting someone's house for them including smoking pot at the end of the day of painting? Ethical behaviour could be associated with the drug users but might not include the drug directly. In fact, I have found that marijuana users as an in-group that Becker identifies well, have a certain in-group solidarity which could cause and does cause some to behave ethically, that is behave in a good and helpful way to other in-group members. People in the in-group would rather work for, do favours for, support other in-group members. All these support actions could be considered to be good acts and thus morally and ethically proper in their own right, but Becker does not open up the word morals very widely to see all this. He does leave it possible in his book to make further conlusions but he only really looks at morals as creating sanctions against use. This is about as narrow a view as the stereotype he gets this idea from.

Of course, a broader look at the musicans would look at thier productivity in bringing music to the world as a good act. Productivity is the thing supposed to be lacking in the moral view of the stereotype. Yet, many of our best and most popular rock 'n' roll music has been made by drug users. Also, the creation of the in-group solidarity is by itself a good thing in that it produces an ordering and this is a difficult enough task that it should be applauded when it has happened like in the case of dance hall musicians. Numerous are the stories of musicians overcoming their drug problems because they got help from other musicians to get clean. Creating social solidarity is, as far as, I can see apriori a good act.

I just completed reading the first paper after reading the introduction on Thursday and Friday in Sheptycki, J.W.E. Ed. Issues in Transnational Policing (London: Routledge, 2000). The first article was Johnston, Les. Transnational Private Policing: the Impact of Global Commercial Security. This article was more of an economics piece or business report on international commercial security companies than an in depth theoretical piece. He does suggest that private security could produce some good results. In particular he suggested the preventative approach of commerical risk reduction could be likened to harm reduction in prisons as opposed to the punishment style corrections linked to reactive policing. It seems the beginning of this book is mostly terminologial giving me words to use in the study of policing.

I managed to make five pages of notes on this blog in four days.

My latest study topic is policing. I have it seems been studying directly the policing literature for about a month now. In four months I could find my self studying policing in a criminal law issues course at school. That course starts in January 2005. No I don't want to be a police person or professional but the topic is interesting and certainly related to my present work as a security guard and my latest volunteering in victims services. Some studies suggest preventative policing that we security guards do is actually similar to a more humane approach to corrections in that reactive punishment is not practiced but rather harm reduction and rehabilition is the prefered positive outcome.

Grief needs to be expressed for children heading back to school who didn't make it this year. The crimes in a school terroism incident are chilling me right now. My tears of rage are shed for these poor victims. My going back to school is great this year but some people somewhere in the world will now never have a chance to study because they have been murdered by terrorists. This is sad and the worlds armys should put down there weapons once and for all. I guess, Russia will never survive her military excursions.

I completed reading Sheptycki, J.W.E. The 'drug war': learning from the paradigm example of transnational policing in Sheptycki, J.W.E. Ed. Issues in Transnational Policing (London: Routledge, 2000). This is for week 6 of the LAWS4306B course and will be taken up on October 19th, 2004. The topic that day will be policing and drugs. So I was wrong that this paper was included for the books' main arguments concerning transnational perspectives in the social sciences. It is not meant to be a paper just on the topic of drug laws and international perspectives. Instead I must see this paper as contributing to my knowledge of policing and drug laws in the international sense. In fact, the end and later half of the paper is more specifically about how policing internationally is solidified around drug law enforcement.

In conclusion Sheptycki makes three points, one non-state actors affected international drug law formation in the past and could act to reform laws and this might be something or someone, while difficult to predict, to be watched for in the international drug law scene. But also this reflection will help us study transnational policing and the international state system as this paper calls it. Second point, is that sub state actors, namley officals in charge of national agencies, play a role in international relationships. Again suggested for study are these roles that Sheptycki feels are ignored by senior state officals. Third point, Sheptycki suggests we take away from this article is that police studies must look at what is termed "High Policing" rather than looking at the local municipal and national level of policing or the study I have done on my own all summer namely studying policing work and tools. Thus, although the first two points concern law making and law reform, the third point suggests something about the focus of police studies and carries the topic with an international dimension. But international drug laws are not really looked at until week 9 November 9th. I guess this article prepares us for week 9 at the same time as it works in week 6.

Although the International policing efforts around anti-terrorism in the 1970's is mentioned as equivalent to the drug law policing in the 1990's, the article was written in 2000 and thus does not account for the obvious change in focus from drugs back to anti-terrorism that has occured this past few years. Somehow I was thinking that terrorists had managed to be the actors that changed this focus of international policing. Also interesting is what could be become of Canada as an international relevant state when we change our marijuana laws shortly. Needless to say I can totally agree with Sheptycki that it is the bureaucracy that will act to prevent the reform of the drug laws.

I am up late studying and waiting for the morning paper that I will deliver to the neighbourhood, then I will study and stay up until my Staples order of computer/school supplies arrives, than I will sleep. I will start the cycle of night studies again on Thursday night Friday morning. The next appointment I have is on Friday at 4 PM so hopefully if my sleep plan works I will sleep only once before Friday's appointment. This will be bad for my physcial and mental health but good for my productivity in the short term. Maybe I can get a fair amount completed in my legal studies work for the term in the next few days before classes even begin.

I reread the parts of Sheptycki, J.W.E. The 'drug war': learning from the paradigm example of transnational policing in Sheptycki, J.W.E. Ed. Issues in Transnational Policing (London: Routledge, 2000) that I first read on the day I borrowed this book. These sections in this paper start with a suggestion of the wider implications of studying transnational policing to the study of globalisation, then covers the historical interplay of domestic drug policy and international law. Domestic policy in the USA(prohibitionists with criminal law results), and then Europe(prohibitionists and drug companies with medical regulation results), is described and sequenced with the international legal and geopolitical events such as the American-Spanish war and briefly the European world wars.

Somewhere in this section is coverage of the drug laws being used to control immigrants to the USA. But this leaves me with an understanding of Canada that either must be little brother to the USA in terms of immigrant control or leaves me with no understanding of what might have been our drug control history. It also seems very Euro centred. This is the International section of this LAWS4306B course? Parla vous Français?

I just read the preface and executive summary of What is a Crime? by the Law Commission of Canada. This study or paper was recommended to me both by my new supervisor in my honours paper course and my Mom's roommate. It had been written about by Dan Gardener a local criminal law journalist. My mom's roommate had sent me the link to the article a few months ago after Gardener wrote about it and my mom's roommate Hugh had read the article. I had read it a little back then. Today I was struck by the psychological language with the word behaviour used extensively when what is meant is actions by individuals. Near the end of the executive summary some mention is made of the difficulty with viewing crimes as individualistic in other words individuals being held responsible for their acts. I would prefer an objective or is it subjective standard of intention, where one looks at the group an individual belongs too such as a teen hacker as part of the group of limited income youngsters, thus not being punishable for their intent with the same standard for intent as a group of middle class high income Internet users in their thirties.

An exciting book chosen for reading in LAWS4306B is the book, Sheptycki, J.W.E. Ed. Issues in Transnational Policing (London: Routledge, 2000). It is actually only the 7th and last chapter by Sheptycki that concerns us in LAWS4306B, titled The 'drug war': learning from the paradigm example of transnational policing. I might also have to write a reaction to this chapter. This chapter suggests other topics though in public law such as governance and the whole book opens up to other fields as studies that might gain by studying policing, so this chapter could open up future topics, rather than just fill in work for LAWS4306B.

Like the Becker though I began to read the beginning of this book and would also like to read chapter 6 titled, Policing new social spaces by Manning, Peter K.. This chapter 6 seems like it could be helpful for understanding my computer crime topic from both a policing angle and also give it a little more of an international perspective.

I dropped LAWS4903C, international criminal law issues, a few days ago and read the now posted outline for the course early on Wednesday afternoon. It looks like it will be a very informative course and very difficult, as far as, these legal studies courses go. It is also very comprehensive in its scope and it is a shame that I did not stick with that course. But I have started to study the LAWS4306B concerning drugs and drug users and the state and thus am going to stick with this drug law course for the fall. Also this drug law course is taught by a full time faculty member and those are the people I must get to know better in an academic sense, so that I can continue to study with them if I choose the law department to do my graduate school within.

Also at this point the fine tuning of my course choices is being done by scheduled time of the seminars, lectures, and labs, given that this is a key factor to in my study success. I am sticking with the one math course, MATH3806, in numerical analysis using MATHLAB because this both leads to the course MATH3807, mathematical software, and is needed to upgrade my B.Math to honours level.

At the same time because this could be my last undergraduate year, I have to, in the next two months, apply to Law School, teachers college, grad school and any other school's I can afford to apply to for Fall 2005.

Like I said yesterday or the day before. I finally read a classic in criminology namely, Becker, Howard. The Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance (New York: The Free Press, 1963). I read the first four chapters and may have to write a reaction paper or in class presentation on chapter four. This fourth chapter concerns the constraints on use of marijuana including bad trips and reasons for first use, and continued use of this drug. The study is made up of interviews from the musician community that the author, Becker was himself a member of, but it is unclear if Becker was himself a user of drugs. The first chapter outlines his main contributions to criminology concerning defintions of deviance and the notion of the outsider. This includes the concepts of primary and secondary deviance.

I want to complete my BA in Legal studies by the end of next summer. So this is the main goal in choosing courses. I need to take two legal studies courses this term to do that. One course is a full year course.

In this full year course, LAWS4908 I will be writing an honours essay with Neil Sargent supervising me. We have agree on a paper that questions the definition of computer crime. So that course counts as one course for both fall and winter terms.

The other legal studies course might be one looking at drugs, drug users and the state, LAWS4306B and Dawn Moore is the professor. I have read Howard Becker's the Outsiders yesterday and today because this book is one of the weeks readings for LAWS4306B. I have downloaded other weeks' readings and have browsed some of the other readings in the library. This course is a critical look at drug laws.

But instead of this law course I might try a course in international criminal law issues, LAWS4903C. I haven't decided which of these last two I will study. The international criminal law would be good to know for computer crime studies but the drug law course would also be useful as this is the most common criminal law issue I face in Canadian society. Also the laws concerning marijuana might be changed very soon so this would be a good course to follow these changes closely.

Ok that's two courses and usually what I study in terms of course load. It is also officially a full time load for a disabled student. I will need two law courses in winter one being the last half of LAWS4908, the paper and the other maybe medical issues in criminal law, like the insanity defence for instance.

But this summer I was enjoying helping teach statistics and last school year I enjoyed the people in our math department where I worked as a teachers assistant. I also borrowed and read and am reading a number of math books successfully. So I wanted to add a third course in math or statistics to my study load.

My dad and brother have now agreed that I should be supported to try a heavier course load. My argument is that I am doing great in school including a top of the class mark this summer so I should be allowed to see if I can recover fully to a full time job or study load. If I find it too much I can go back to a lower course load in January. I am very pleased with their support. But because of this I will not apply to be a teaching assistant in two departments this term. I will only try to be a TA in the math department ot the law department at the same time.

Yesterday, I completed reading the first chapter of the three computer
crime books I boorrowed. These are the cites for the three books.

Sieber, Ulrich. Ed. Information Technology Crime: National Legislation,
Jus Informationis European Series on Information Law v 6 (Köln: Carl
Heymanns Verlag, 1994).

Sofaer, Abraham D. & Goodman, Seymour E. Ed. The Transnational Dimension
of Cyber Crime and Terrorism (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution, 2001).

Davis, Robert W.K. & Hutchinson, Scott C. Computer Crime in Canada: An
Introduction to Technological Crime and Related Legal Issues (Toronto,
ON: Carswell, 1997).

I read the first chapter of three computer crime books I borrowed.

I am studying computer crime this morning. I worked on my paper on computer crime on my Linux computer using Open Office. I read from three books early this morning. I am at the same space I was last year in school. I am attempting to use a Linux system for the whole term. This time I am trying to use a Linux desktop for the whole year.

I decided on going through with studying the honours paper course, after the supervisor I found, professor Neil Sargent, agreed to a paper on computer crime. He teaches our corporate crime course in fourth year and often teaches the second year Introduction to Private Law course and recently has been teaching parts of the first year Introduction to Legal Studies. He has given me something to go on now. He likes my idea of looking at the definition of computer crime. This topic I gathered from an article in Wall, David S. Ed. Crime and the Internet (New York, Routledge, 2001). The article is Levi, Michael. "Between the risk and the reality falls the shadow": Evidence and urban legends in computer fraud ( with apologies to T.S. Eliot).

This following program written in C++ is for exercise #4 in chapter 3 of Ross's Simulation 2d. By the way I looked up how to write into this blog, the less than and greater than signs in the program where the include statement is. These weren't showing up as the blog thought they were an html tag.
//
// A C++ program for integrating a continuous random variable (1-x^2)^(3/2) between 0-1 and finding its expected value or mean.//

#include <iostream>
int Kvalue;
float Svalue;
int Seed;
float x;
int countK;
float Expected;



int main()

{


std::cout << "Enter integer for random seed: ";
std::cin >> Seed;
void srand(unsigned int Seed);


std::cout << "Enter integer for length of Simulation: ";
std::cin >> Kvalue;
countK=0;
Svalue = 0;
while (Kvalue >= countK)

{

x= (float) ( rand() / (RAND_MAX + 1 ) );
Svalue= Svalue + pow((1-x*x),(3/2));


countK++;
}

Expected= Svalue/Kvalue;
std::cout << "Expected Value = ";
std::cout << Expected;
std::cout << "Svalue = ";
std::cout << Svalue;
std::cout << "Kvalue = ";
std::cout << Kvalue;
return 0;

}

Hugh Petrie made this graphic art on the web.http://hughphoto.tripod.com/MonarchFace/ScreenApplet.html

Peter Moore gave me some books last night. These are those books:

Gandhi, M. K. Non-Violent Resistance (New York: Schocken, 1951).

This book I loaned him. I bought it used somewhere or someone gave it to me. I saw the Gandhi movie in the 1980's and read Fisher's biography of Gandhi. Jenny has also read a biography of Gandhi.

Timmerman, Jacob. Prisoner With out a Name, Cell Without a Number Talbot, Toby. Trans. (New York: Vintage, 1981).

This book I picked up in my active membership in Amnesty International days in the early 1990's. I loaned this book to Peter a couple of years ago.

Pearsall, Thomas E., Cunningham, Donald H. & Tovey, Alan S. How to Write for the World of Work (Toronto, ON: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1988).

Peter is a journalist. This book seems to be one of his trade books. I have not read it or seen it before.

The other books are computer books. Some he is returning. Some are books I have never seen before and some look out of date.

I started working through the simulation exercises in chapter 3 of Ross's Simulation. Here is the C++ program for simulating the random variable exp(exp(x)) between 0-1.

//
// A C++ program For integrating a continous random variable exp(exp(X)) between 0-1 and finding its expected value or mean.//
#include
int Kvalue;
float Svalue;
int Seed;
float U;
int countK;
float Expected;



int main()
{

std::cout << "Enter integer for random seed: ";
std::cin >> Seed;
void srand(unsigned int Seed);


std::cout << "Enter integer for length of Simulation: ";
std::cin >> Kvalue;
countK=0;
Svalue = 0;
while (Kvalue >= countK)
{

U= (float) ( rand() / (RAND_MAX + 1 ) );
Svalue= Svalue + exp(exp(U));


countK++;
}

Expected= Svalue/Kvalue;
std::cout << "Expected Value = ";
std::cout << Expected;
std::cout << "Svalue = ";
std::cout << Svalue;
std::cout << "Kvalue = ";
std::cout << Kvalue;
return 0;
}

I have been studying for the past 9 years mostly in night school or using televised lectures. My basic scheduling goal has been made around not taking morning classes. I try not to take morning classes. But school is on a 9-5 clock generally althought the school's hours are more like 8-22. So the school is generally open 14 hours in the regular term. I have studied on this 14-10 clock for about 9 years now and worked in this clock for money for about 1 year now. I applied to do this job again this fall term. I am also considering increasing my study load this term by one course to three courses total per term. This is about 9 hours of lectures and would mean about 27-36 hours out of class study per week. My family generally do not approve of a heavier study load than two courses and the only time I have tried the three course load was in 1987 and I failed all three courses. But I am generally doing very well with school right now so this maybe possible to up the study load. At the moment my dad has paid for two courses so either he will also pay for the third, or I will be able to get a bursary for paying for the third. The other possibility which might be good but is unrealistic is for me to pay myself. The more likely possibility is that I only study two courses given that school is time consuming and a major stressor in my life.

I am still not completely sure of what subjects I will study this term. I have spaces in both legal studies and in statistics courses, but will drop some of these courses later this coming week. I have been reading books to prepare for both set of courses. In fact, I am reading a medical handbook on the alcohol and drug abuse to prepare for one law course that concerns law and drug abuse and the government. Our country might be decriminalising marijuana use this year or next. The senate have reccommended marijuana use be made no longer a crime. The bill makers in the commons have been considering this for about a year now and certain election promises were made concerning this.

For statistics I have been reviewing probability and random variables. I have also made my first C++ program. This program functions to simulate a random variable.

I might if I take the three statistics courses, be studying numerical analysis which is in this courses' professor's approach solving differential equations using MATHLAB software. I am aware that we will cover Newton's method. We will also cover error which should be both a review for me and an extention into the post-modern world of error. I have met with the professor of this course in July.

I will in another course be studying queueing theory and markov chains and have been teaching myself these in August. I have been reading an older edition of the course textbook these past three weeks. The professor for this course is the director of the school.

The third course concerns multivariant analysis and is taught by a senior professor who helped me study for my three year statistics degree. I would hope to have her as a graduate supervisor too. Her field is applied statistics where my critical view of statistics helps me to figure things out. She also teaches datamining and I might take her datamining course next term.

Actually if I also study three statistics courses next Winter term, I believe they are all on Monday's so would only have one day of school a week. It would be a very busy day but less than 12 hours. It would also include two 2 hour breaks.

This term some of the courses are early morning but using my sleep planning I seem to have gotten a schedule for my week that would work quite well for attendance and extra study but every day of the week would have about 1 hour on campus or more. This would generally mean I would only work at my main part time job on weekends. But weekends was one of the shifts that I was originally hired to work.

My bike got a flat. I took the bus yesterday. I got vitamins and got the graded assignments into the professor. I stayed up about seven extra hours and then slept until about midnight. I am working a night shift on Sunday night. Right now I am helping with the newspaper delivery.

I reviewed some of Morris, Mary E. S. & Massie Paul. Cyber Careers (Mountain View, CA: Sun Microsystems, 1998). I reviewed the developing one's self chapter. I did some inch pebbles for this past week in my private journal.

The summer work as a TA is over now.

I completed marking the remaining questions for the assignment #3. I also emailed the professor the marks. I am just leaving to school now on my bike to drop off the assignments all marked. I will also take a ride to a 24 hour pharmacy to pick up vitamins. I am thinking of increasing my study load to 1.5 credits per term. I have an appointment to see an advisor on Tuesday next week at 3 PM. Then we have a Teaching Assistant union BBQ at 5 PM that day.

I completed marking question 3. This question was a confidence limit with sigma known using the Z table. Also a sample size question concerned getting a 99% confidence level.

I completed marking question number 2 for all the student's assignments. This question was about confidence intervals when sigma or the standard deviation is not known thus the t table is used to calculate the confidence intervals. I learned this in my undergarduate statistics degree.

I read a little of the qualitiative research method's chapter in the book Bachman, Ronet & Schutt, Russel K. The Practice of Research in Criminology and Criminal Justice, 2d (Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press, 2003). I thought of the book on qualitiative research into recovery from schizophrenia I read in the spring. I also thought of a gang study I read in the year 1993. I read that book in 1993 in one day and it was 300 pages long. I just stayed up late to finish it back then. That book concluded that gangs were modeled or modelable on American business with graffiti as advertising and I don't seem to remember much else from the model. The author of the study was a scholar in Chicago and the study was a participant observation study. I also thought of a covert researcher/labour organizer study I read a couple of years ago. I also thought of David Hakken and his participant studies in computer use by organizations. I reflected on all these as my building knowledge in sociology and anthropology and its field work techniques.

I read chapter 1 in Hermanns, Holger. Interactive Markov Chains: And the Quest for Quantified Quality (Berlin: Springer, 2002). This statistics book describes a method for modeling the performance of complex systems in particular this could apply to computer systems.

I was able to download a copy of Windows XP professional with SP1 because the mathematics and statistics department has an agreement with the MSDN Academic Alliance. I needed this because the WinXP laptop I have did not come with a WinXP CD. I can now maybe try to make this laptop dual boot. The WinXP CD will be for a system recovery if the installation fails.

I have been marking the final assignment for STAT3502. I have marked the first question for all the students now.

I took some time off my city committee volunteering today and am feeling much more relaxed. I actually had some union volunteering to do this afternoon. I checked on school books in the school book store. The books for my courses are not in the bookstore yet. I looked at new books in the library. I came home and chatted at Yahoo. I am just going out to buy my wife ice cream but maybe I'll try to talk her out of eating ice cream. I have a Mac, a WinXP laptop and a Linux computer all running right now.

This program inspired from chapter 3 of Ross, Sheldon. Simulation 2d (San Diego: Academic, 1997) will calculate the average value of X^2 between x=1-10 for a discrete version of x squared.

//
// A C++ program For Integrating a random variable (X^2) and finding its expected value or mean.//
#include
int Kvalue;
int Svalue;
int Seed;
int U;
int countK;
float Expected;



int main()
{

std::cout << "Enter integer for random seed: ";
std::cin >> Seed;
void srand(unsigned int Seed);
std::cout << "Enter integer for length of Integral: ";
std::cin >> Kvalue;
countK=0;
Svalue = 0;
while (Kvalue >= countK)

{

U= 1 + (int) ( 10.0 * rand() / (RAND_MAX + 1.0) );
Svalue= Svalue + U * U;


countK++;
}

Expected= Svalue/Kvalue;
std::cout << "Expected Value = ";
std::cout << Expected;
std::cout << "Svalue = ";
std::cout << Svalue;
std::cout << "Kvalue = ";
std::cout << Kvalue;
return 0;
}

I read chapter 1 and 2 yesterday and chapter 3 today of this book: Ross, Sheldon. Simulation 2d (San Diego: Academic, 1997). I started to make the programs to simulate random variables using Quincy, a C++ IDE using gcc. So I spent about an hour today trying to write C++ code.

I finished chapter 1 of Roulstone, Alan. Enabling Technology: Disabled People, Work and New Technology (Buckingham: Open University, 1998), this morning. I read chapter 2 this evening.

We need to sell my wife's book at an up coming community picnic. My wife's book is Saint Saens, Jennifer. Jenny's Sky (Ottawa, ON: Sky Rock, 2004). We need to order some more books from the printer before September 11th, the date of the picnic.

I am starting to read two computer books afresh. These two new books I am adding to my knowledge are:

Hutter, Dieter. et al, Eds. Security in Pervasive Computing: First International Conference, Boppard, Germany, March 2003. Revised Papers (Berlin: Springer, 2004).

The first few papers are only one page long or so.

Brock, Gerald, W. The Secondary Information Revolution (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 2003)

This is a book from the Network Engineering section of the library. It is a book in English. Like Mueller, M. L. Ruling the Root, Internet Governance and the Taming of Cyberspace (Cambridge, MA: The Mit Press, 2002) it is a history of technology.

One other book I am reading on technology and disability is: Roulstone, Alan. Enabling Technology: Disabled People, Work and New Technology (Buckingham: Open University, 1998).

I am working a night shift Thursday night. I completed my tutoring work for the summer today. I completed my tutorial hours for the summer in STAT3502. I said goodbye to the students and let them know they were a challenging group to TA. They are all engineering students.

I chose law courses for the fall and winter terms. I am letting the statistics course go now. I still have some books out on statistics from the school library. These books are:

Janacek, Garth. Practical Time Series (London: Arnold, 2001).

This is the first math book in awhile that I am able to read. Also I do not have to read this book for work or any current studies or courses. I have borrowed it for about a month now or more. I got through two chapters and this book allowed me to discover R and also in the end discover xemacs for for the WinXP laptop I have. It covers smoothing as well as time series stuff. I got the next book out on smoothing after reading this first book a little.

Bowman, Adrian W. & Azzalini, Adelchi. Applied Smoothing Techniques for Data Analysis: The Kernal Approach with S-Plus Illustrations (Oxford: Clarendon, 1997).

I have only really gotten half way through the first chapter of this book

Ross, Sheldon. Introduction to Probability Models 6d (San Diego: Academic, 1997)

I scanned this book's first four chapters which introduce probability. I read and understood the introduction of markov chains.

Ross, Sheldon. Simulation 2d (San Diego: Academic, 1997)

I haven't even opened this book beyong making this citation note.

Alexander, Kenneth S. & Watkins, Joseph C. Eds. Spatial Stochastic Processes: A Festschrift in Honor of Ted Harris on his Seventieth Birthday. (Boston: Birkhäuser, 1991).

I have not read this book really either

Hermanns, Holger. Interactive Markov Chains: And the Quest for Quantified Quality (Berlin: Springer, 2002).

This book as well has been opened to a minimum.

I got down to deciding on statistics courses these past two days. I told a number of people today about this decision and they all seemed to listen but one of them approved of this choice. This person is in fact a school counselor. Also a professor in the legal studies department, said he likes my balanced approach which I mentioned as my reason to the couselor as well today. In fact, no one has disagree expect my father who approves of the legal studies courses. Most people I talk with don't care because that is not thier job. But one fellow, a former classmate did active listening to what I was saying. He is applying for law school in New Zealand.

So these statistics courses were today's choice. Even if by the end of the day I was reading crime analysis and wanting to continue with the legal studies because the statistics courses needed to upgrade my B.Math would take a good two years of study. After today when I was tired it seemed that statistics would be more difficult to do well with, but it was statistics as my choice for most of the day. After writing this I am keen on the statistics again too. In fact, I browsed books I will need for these courses at amazon.ca. I then borrowed this book for one course. Ross, Sheldon. Introduction to Probability Models 6d (San Diego, Academic, 1997). I scan read the first four chapters which cover probability and basically the same materials as parts of STAT3502 and STAT3508. But I read the introduction to stochastic processes and also Markov chains.

I worked for 4 hours today at school. Tomorrow the plan is to work for another 4 hours and then 4 hours on Wednesday. I earned 20$ today tutoring a student in PSYC2002 and the F test statistic. I also earned 34$ giving a tutorial session for a few students in STAT3502. Tomorrow I am tutoring the same student again in PSYC2002 and then again on Wednesday and that's it for him this term. Also tomorrow I am tutoring another student in MATH1007 for two hours. Then I tutor him again for one hour on Wednesday. Also on Wednesday I will give one more hour of tutorial. I will also begin 6 to 8 hours of marking assignments for STAT3502 earning about 17 dollars per hour doing this. This will be my last duties in being a TA in STAT3502. Work school, school work.

I just completed reading a simple book with a lot of information thoughtfully presented in crime analysis. I spoke with the Ottawa Police recruiter last year and they have about 12 crime analysts with the Ottawa Police. The book is Vann, Irvin B. & Garson, G David. Crime Mapping: New Tools of Law Enforcement (New york: Peter Lang, 2003). This study continues my learning about GIS from GEOG2007 with little more info about ESRI products. Continuing my GIS education with this book helped me integrate my knowldge of traditional maps and mapping with post-modern GIS mapping in regards crime mapping. It probably also makes me a better city volunteer and victims assistance volunteer. I now know some issues of privacy concerning location of crime victims. This book also extends my studies in GIS and terrorism that I started in summer 2004 with LAWS4701.

I am having trouble deciding courses. First about math and statistics courses I will write. I have ruled out one course in numercial analysis as it is early morning. Only one course stochastic processes and queueing theory remains a possibility with early morning requirements. In this second course the tutorial is set for Monday mornings at 9 am. I am fairly certain I don't want the first course. I did talk to the professor and he would be good and friendly and helpful but the early morning schedule preculdes studying it this year. That basically leaves only two statistics courses to choose from in mathematics and statistics for the fall term. There is really only one philosophy course on social and political philosophy. There are five possible law courses and I can only take two at most.

"Read widely" Mike Fox, geography professor at Carleton University on how to study geography and use a library.

I am reading in criminal law, geography, statistics, alcohol studies, telecommunications history, computer security, perl, and crime mapping. I am sort of settling down to studying law and drug abuse this fall term. I will also start to write a fourth year honours paper. This paper I hope is on disablities and the law or computer crime. One of those two topics. This morning my plan for fall 2005 is to start to study for a Ph.D in sociology specializing in statistics, disability studies and criminology.

I am reading these geography books right now:

Duckham, Matt, Goodchild, Michael F. & Worboys Michael F. Eds. Foundations of Geographic Information Science (London: Taylor & Francis, 2003).

I just started this book and have not gotten far with it. I read the basic attempts at defining geographic information sciences.

Rushton, K.R. Groundwater Hydrology: Conceptual and Computational Models (Chichester, West Sussex, England: Wiley, 2003).

With this book I have just read the introductory chapter and then followed the author's suggestions for novices to scan the book. It is very complex math and uses case studies. The math though is not beyond me and it uses only math I can understand with my B.Math degree as far as I can see by the diagrams and cross sections.

That's it for geography books I am reading right now.

Some people I know write user doucmentation as such this might be useful for them in their work. It is a link written by Avi Solomon in a comment from Kevin Kelly's web site on his Help Wanted Blog.

How To Write Usable User Documentation by Edmond H. Weiss
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0897746392/

I started reading Cross, David. Data Munging with PERL (Greenwich, CT: Manning, 2001), yesterday. It too is a book with humour and attempts at being cultural.

I am starting to prepare for the criminal law issues course that covers Drugs, Users and the State. I am reading Brick, John. Ed. Handbook of the Medical Consequences of Alcohol and and Drug Abuse (New York: The Haworth Press, 2004). I read the first chapter this evening.

The book I just read, after studying terrorism laws in LAWS4701 the criminal justice and social policy summer school, was Archick, Kristin & Gallis, Paul. Europe and Counterterrorism (New York: Nova Science Publishers, 2003).

I have spent 12 hours now in training for victims services. I have 28 hours left to go then an exam and then I am certifed. I won't write too much about this work here as I have signed a confidentiality agreement.

I worked only one hour today, tutoring. Tomorrow I might work three hours tutoring. On Saturday I work 4:30 hours then 7:30 hours Sunday morning. This is the Saturday night shift. I am then working the night shift again on next Thursday and will have to miss three hours of training that night. I will also help with the newspapers on Saturday morning and maybe Friday morning.

I need to prepare for Monday's final tutorial and get ready to mark the classes final assignment. I hope to have this marked by Thursday or Friday next week.