To be honest, I didn't know where I was going to head. I left my last job and took seven months off where all I did was camp out in the Rocky Mountains for weeks at a time.

I then found an interesting position as a solution architect in and about the same area I lived in that I applied for and received. That included a lot of custom per-client Python coding.

Some of the politics I don't agree with, but it's a bit more of a flat structure where I have direct access to people like the CTO where I can discuss stuff with. I also get to make my own design decisions without 18 layers of red tape hindering me.

Someday I'll code Perl professionally. For now, I am very happy doing what I do, with the ability to interact with Perl sites during breaks in my day, and writing a boatload of open source code for the CPAN.

I'm still in frequent communication with people from my past jobs so I'm up to speed on things such as core Internet routing etc, but stepping back and being able to blame engineers and IT departments has become something I like :)

(Of course, I do this mostly politely and with respect, as I know what it's like to work there.)