Ask HN: My character sheet makes no sense
I started college right after high school in CS, but, bored out of my mind and depressed, dropped out after a year and enlisted in the Marines soon after that.
During my four-year enlistment, I fought in Iraq twice, saw the West Pacific (Japan, Thailand, Guam), and got pretty good at killing people.
After I got out, I went back to school on the GI Bill and got my B.A. in Comparative Literature, because I wanted to study something that would keep me engaged and interested, and I assumed I would be able to learn any technical skills (programming, which I was still interested in) on my own. Having gotten a bit older and gained a lot more discipline, I did much better in school the second time around, and raised my cumulative GPA from about 1.7 to 3.3, by maintaining almost perfect grades for those three years.
I graduated in 2009, which I understand was historically the worst time to do so. I was unemployed for six months, then finally got a low level adminstrative job in the federal government through veteran's preference. I also got married and bought a house. My job is a little bit soul-killing and doesn't pay very well. But it's tolerable (I've been through a lot worse) and secure.
I'm currently teaching myself to program for Android. It's fun but slow going, since my free time is limited. So slow, that I'm realizing that it probably isn't going to be more than a hobby unless I change something.
So: Infantry Marine: Level 4| Comparer of Literatures: Level 4| Bureaucracy Admin: Level 2| Rock-climber: Level 6| Programmer: Level 0
My options look to me like: 1. Stay in the fed. gov. Boring, but safe. 2. Go back to school. I like academia and I'd be interested in studying CS, HCI, or IA, but I'm afraid of student loans and 'higher-education bubble' talk. And I've got a mortgage to pay. 3. Find employment in a field I enjoy. I write essays on my blog about tech and tech products. A friend of mine at a software megacorp is convinced that I'd be a good Project Manager in the sense of Joel Spolsky's User Advocate. But neither of us see a path to there from here.
So my current plan is to put in my 40 hours, program Android by night, and regularly spam job listings, hoping that I'll slip through a filter somehow and be able to convince somebody I'm worth taking a chance on.
Advice?