>I know what you're saying but my advice is don't make any hasty decisions. Radical changes of direction like open source may be for developers far younger than you and me. Microsoft and the CP program do bring advantages. C# and VB are not going away any time soon. .NET is not going away any time soon. Microsoft is annoying with the changes of strategic direction but we already knew that. We are in the same age range and the career decisions that make sense for us may not be the same ones an unmarried 20 something would make.
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>Me, I'm going for a bike ride, setting the recorder for college football and game 3 of the World Series, and turning the computer off for the rest of the day.

Good for you to be more on the active side again! While living off almost nothing again while producing something new is less enticing nowadays, you might take the time to play with some new things (Python, Haskell, Metaprogramming, Functional Programming) not because you fear for no income, but to keep the fun in working in our field [especially when the grind of the job is getting to you again, as it will some time in the future...]). It does not have to be radical, but there are *good* new things as well to discover and use for yourself.

Packing the swim trunks and heading for some swimming and sauna myself...

regards

thomas