Three long days

[glenatron]

After three painful days of beating my head against the wall I have managed to establish that the OpenSSL implementation in the Windows distribution of Ruby 1.8.4 is completely broken. There are few technical problems more irritating to deal with than a failure in a tool because statistically speaking bugs are far more likely to be down to the programmer, especially when you're working with new tools.

I've rolled back to 1.8.2 and that seems to have done the trick- I still have loads of difficult stuff to do, but at least it's solvable problems now rather than totally impossible ones.

I've also come to the conclusion that there is no point trying to persist as a freelancer- I'm tired of scrabbling around desperately to have enough money to cover the mortgage each month, having to constantly sponge off Lou and never knowing when I'm going to get paid for the work I've already done. Having a bit of control over my own time is all well and good, but having enough money to be able to afford food or new clothes occasionally would be wonderful. Many of my reasons for persisting this long were to do with the band and the chances of that taking off, but in all honesty I don't think I serve them best by starving and not being able to afford to get to gigs, pay for rehearsal or get my round in.

Having made that decision I am feeling a lot happier about the world than I have in a while. I'm going to have a hell of a time finishing up my outstanding jobs, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel which is not necessarily a train.

Comments

Good on ya

[(Anonymous)]

Nice one. Sounds like the right thing to do. I reckon a bit of contracting for big companies while finishing off the jobs you've got might do you really well. Still pitch for work if it comes in, take it but with specific specifications and time scales (and fair and large quotes) and if they say no then screw them. I love the first track of that album (marching bands)...it's great.

[life-of-tom.livejournal.com]

good luck with that. At the end of the day, you need to do what's going to take care of yourself best. you'll probably be a little better placed to get a job now, too, having spent a while advertising yourself to local companies, and doing all kinds of interesting things. Oh, and good choice on Death Cab for Cutie; Transatlanticism is a really good album, if you haven't heard it.