Just a quick comment on (6.) . While I agree with you that the economy as a whole is nowhere near a recession I am of the mind, as are others that I have spoken with locally, that we are in the midst of a "high tech recession". I am willing to bet that of people who would call themselves programmers, sysadmins, net admins, etc that the unemployment rate is above 5%. Also, basically, a recession is characterized by negative growth and as the nightly news is quick to remind us, there hasn't been much growth in the tech sector recently. I agree with the rest of the post and hope I haven't been too much a downer >;). My most recent job search took me over three months so I definitly recommend a patient and optimistic attitude. There exists a light at the end of the tunnel.......