I am often amazed by how much freedom a lot of people here have. I'm a graduate student in physics after betraying my first love in programming because I thought I would end up in a 9 to 5 dead end hacking job, I never heard of this whole "freelance" and start-up scene, otherwise, I would have done that.

I'm happy for you and you should feel very blessed to have the options you have. That just isn't an option for so many of us.