I'm starting to wonder if I'm really cut out for being a code monkey. On this contract I'm the architect and senior coder, and we're wrapping up about eight weeks of requirements and starting ten weeks of writing code.
I can't focus. I'm bored with it. Doing this for 40+ hours a week is a challenge. The work itself is not difficult work for me, I just can't look at it for extended periods of time. My attention span won't allow it. That's a real pain.
I spend a lot of time thinking about other things, like volleyball in particular. This is going to be insane when I start doing that five or six days a week and at the same time do contract work for 40 or more hours. But volleyball feeds the soul, and that part of me is not entirely whole right now, so it takes precedence.
At the same time, I need to resolve some of this debt that has been piling up. I've been able to throw a couple grand at it here and there, but it feels like I'm not making adequate progress. The business debt is what bothers me the most, because if that wasn't there, it would be mostly profit for me.
Grrrrrr... does anyone every figure this shit out? I wouldn't say that I'm unhappy, but things aren't precisely peachy either.
Let's see, after 20 years in the tech world, Gordon is much happier selling keyboards at Guitar Center. But his income level is only a fraction of what he had before.
So...I would say unless what you love pays enough to let you live the j-pizzie lifestyle, you have a choice of either doing what you love and cutting back on the lifestyle, or supplementing with something you dislike so you can live higher on the hog.
Actually, in our case, just getting out of debt would be fine.
I feel the same way about networking. Working I'm responsible for knowing or will be responsible for knowing Oracle;Sun Solaris;Windows NT;Windows 2000;Windows XP; Firewall Rules; Cisco Routers and Storage Area Networks, then toss in some other apps and a boss that in the past few weeks that suddenly wants it all now and not later. I just got back from 5 days in Ocean City, MD and looking forward to another 7 days in a couple of weeks. At least, this time my boss will be on vacation at the same time I will be and he willn't be able to make my life miserable.