Out of interest, was the work that dried up similar to your 9-5 at all? And when you say near and dear, what are the ties that keep them close to you? Feel free to not answer if that's asking for TMI :)
The shorter term idea is related to beer, and I'm a homebrewer, so that keeps it close. The longer term idea is related to a game I enjoy playing.
I won't be so much putting a solid 10-20 years into something, as I will be waiting 10-20 years for information to be distributed and produced using my software. The software itself should take less than a year of part-time development (if the ideas required succeed), and then idle maintenance/improvements over the course of the 10-20 years required to achieve the final result.
If you're more curious than my broad rambling fulfills, email me and I'm happy to provide specifics. I'm not trying to be secretive, other than I'd like to have something to show before I make any sort of "announcements".