After looking for work for two months, finally got a job offer. Amazing how a positive future can change one's attitude. Two days ago I was in a deep dark hole of depression, feeling so lost that I didn't even have the motivation to play any of my video games. Today, I'm practically dancing about. Course as usual it means I have to start at the bottom job-wise (a position I seem to find myself far too often), but I'm so glad I have a job again I don't care. Even though it will be nearly 3 weeks until I see my first check, I already celebrated a (very little) by ording pizza and getting a small ($10) LEGO model.

And of course, this seems like a good time as any to look back on my long and not too successful employment history. Nearly 25 years ago I got out of the Army, and spent the next two years trying many jobs that didn't work out - Pizza delivery, Vacumn salesman, etc. Then I got a job, orginally data entry, at a local car insurance agency (in Scottsdale, Arizona), which evolved into being a car insurance agent and provided the opportunity of becoming a computer programmer by teaching myself FoxPro. From 1989 to 1998 I stayed at the insurance agency. In retrospect this was the most successful turn of my career, as since then I haven't had a job that lasted nearly as long (7 jobs, averaging 11 months, shortest being 4 months, longest being 29 months), but on the other hand each job since then were higher paying than the previous one.

Of course, every time I start a new job, I keep hoping it will be the one I retire on. At my age, it really is getting harder and harder to keep starting over.