I have had a few subscribers email me asking if I'm going to continue the TtA series. Answer: Yes!
However, I started taking courses offered by Stanford (Game Theory Math and Cryptography). Game Theory is fun and I enjoy it.
Cryptography is significantly harder, and it has a programming component. Making it worse, I decided I'd drop the course when I discovered programming to complete sections of the course. I can write programs, but it is not worth my time to struggle with it when I really wanted a more high level overview. With a heavy heart I wrote the letter to drop the course and sent it off.
About a week later the teacher replied they reexamined the course completion requirements and had dropped the programming portion, making it "extra credit" instead. So, I was back to doing Cryptography! But I had lost two weeks and the first quiz was due in two days (course requires one quiz every week). Since then I've been struggling to catch up with Crypto.
I should be caught up by end of this week, and moving onto a more normal schedule. It is far easier to maintain a workload than to play catch up and be stressed all the time.
So, I hope to be back to a normal schedule soon! And if your interested in some courses from Stanford, please check them out at: https://www.coursera.org/
Once these wrap up I'm thinking of taking a course in Model Thinking or Automata. In early June/late May I will take a week off to prepare for my CISM. One good thing, once I catch up I want to sit and write up a slew of articles, hopefully building up a buffer.