Well-written and inspirational.
After 10 months of unemployment after being laid-off at a goofy startup
doing boring Windows code for a control-freak manager - the company has
since collapsed - I now do freelance electronics design for artists and
others in new york city.  1/3 the income, 50x the personal satisfaction.

Building an electronic art piece for a one-evening show with a PIC (my
2nd microcontroller project ever, the first being something incomplete
in 1997) got noticed and led, directly and indirectly, to three paying
projects.  A chance meeting at a linux audio demo / presentation led to
a 2-month $9K audio design project.  I'm always chatting with techies,
handing out business cards, etc.  A whole different lifestyle than
engineer cog in cubicle from 9:17am until whenever monday to friday.

Nate mentioned oddtodd.com.  Yes!  Very on target.  And, as said in one
of the cartoons, "do what you love and the money will follow".  I did -
the electronic Art project and making the switch from Windows to Linux -
and I still wake up not totally believing my "job" / "career" is for
real.  I'm living 75% of my unemployed lifestyle, only with financial
stability and a little more cohesive end results of EE fiddling.  I
don't know *anyone* in nyc that does what I do.  I have to describe my
work b/c when I tell people the title I made up - "freelance electronics
design" - I get, "what's that?"

Ok back to client research.  Speech compression algorithms suitable for
a PIC to decompress out of flash memory and play - how cool is that?  :)

Jesse



Nate Duehr wrote:
...
>
> The amazing part of the story?  The chain of events that led to the
> place I'm starting with tomorrow?  The manager sent an Instant Messenger
> type message to a friend of mine saying... "I'm looking for someone who
> can do XYZ... any ideas?"... or something similar.  My friend, who still
> knew I was looking because I made it a point to keep in touch with
> *everyone* I knew, said something to the effect of... "You should hire
> Nate."
>
> I know there are lots of folks out there looking for work right now.
> The only advice I can really offer is two-fold... Something WILL come,
> and more importantly, you DO have friends who care about you and you're
> NOT alone.  No matter who you are.  Start a conversation about what you
> do best with everyone you talk to.  Talk to, e-mail, or otherwise
> contact at least five real people a day.  Even if it's just your
> next-door-neighbor.  Do not quit "working" that day at your "job" until
> you have.
>
> The hardest part for hiring managers, even today with huge job databases
> like monster.com, dice.com, etc etc etc... is finding that one person in
> a pile of resumes who will add value to their team, the company, and
> make coming to work as their manager and/or co-worker a joy instead of a
> job.
>

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