I'm not sure what to do. In the past I would have gone on to something else at whatever cost, just picked up my marbles and moved. I'm not sure that works. I talk about a web job, but the web is a lot of things, a lot of disciplines woven together, many of them very different in the talent and habits they require. There's the hardware and the operating systems, the web server and all the associated firewalls and security issues and interconnections with databases on mainframes and Unix boxes and local pipes and wide area pipes and routers and switches and some other shit they talk about behind closed doors in the board room. Hardware and software. Then there's design. How it looks, color and type, concerns about page size, loading times and ease of use. It can't just look good, it has to load fast and be easy to read and draw people to the information they're looking for, all of it measured in a context that makes sense when you present it to management. There are ongoing negotiations with the people who own the sites, what they think they want, what they don't think they want, soothing egos, getting them onto the boat and rowing. Add the budgets and the other crap and you've got a zoo of disciplines to keep happy and producing. What part of that makes me want to get up in the morning? Tomorrow morning, for example.

The same question. How do I handle this? Five years ago I decided to get out of the Novell network business and try contracting with larger companies that could afford to pay me lots of money to play with computers. And pay the rent. Which was past due. I ended up here and by god they did pay me to play with computers. Took me six months to study and pass the CNE exams before I could go out looking. What now? Where do I start and what do I do? First piece is to start doing the job I'm supposed to be doing. Dig in the heels, delete Freecell from that server in the lab and pay attention. Give myself three months and then look and say, well, where does this lead? Nothing worse than sitting on my ass feeling sorry for myself. You do that when you're dead. Not dead yet.