Life Changes - the next update
There have been many changes since then. First of all, it was the 4 week mark on my new job and I was loving it. Well, I made it 6 weeks. At that point they laid off over 50% of the company. The group of 8 developers I was part of lost 6 plus our manager. The only two that stayed were the team lead and another developer that were working on that last killer feature needed for version 1 of the product. Their emergency backup funding sources had suddenly dried up. The owners, who broke the news themselves, seemed shell-shocked. That was Nov. Since then they found just enough funding from other sources to get to their first release. They will need to get a certain number of subscribers to continue past that point. They have until October, 2009 to hit that goal. At this point they have not increased staff at all and in fact have decreased just a little more as a few people have left the company for other jobs since it has become so uncertain there.
In less than 2 weeks I was back to work at my prior employer (before the startup), doing the same kind of thing but in a different development group than before. Everyone seems happy to have me back. That is a nice feeling.
As for the house - we received an offer and are now in the closing period. We hope to be moved in the new (old) house by mid-March. We will own the new house free and clear - no mortgage at all. A very comforting feeling in this time of economic turmoil.
On the writing front - well, what's that saying about best laid plans and stuff? I really hope to start writing more. I want to. And trying to get it going again with the whole upheaval of moving is probably a bad idea. But, I'm doing it anyway. Away I go.