Thank HN: 7 months ago, I asked for help. Now I've got 5 employees.

Second that. Being an extrovert is good for business.

I'd add to that:

Do what you love. Be passionate about your work. Share that passion freely with anyone who will listen.

If you're an engineer, consider buying "Get Clients Now". The cover looks awful. However, it's a great recipe book for learning to market yourself.

Great story, but I hope people won't get inspired by this in the direction to start submitting their request for help for non-sense/non-relevant aspects to the HN Community.

Well, I'm afraid I'm going to disappoint you all and tell you I run a bakery. I know you guys were expecting a tech company.

I wasn't actually planning on revealing this, but you guys seem to really want to know and the community has been good to me. And maybe you can give me more advice.

I actually have a degree in CS and I love to code, but I tried for a while and never managed to make money on my own with my tech skills before Patrick. I figured (correctly, I think) that my problem was not with my hacking abilities but with my business skills - I had absolutely no good sense of what people would give me money for.

In my mind, I saw myself stumbling around on a seemingly infinite plane while I was trying to follow a hill-climbing algorithm to maximize the amount of money I was making. So I imagined something like a random-restart approach might work: let's jump somewhere totally different and try climbing any hills we find there. Plus, I knew that people were willing to give money for baked goods, so I figured that simplified the business component to an extent.

It turns out I was right - I did find a hill to climb and I've gotten a lot better at business in general.

The dilemma now is I really enjoy coding and actually think I have the skills to run a softare business (which could ultimately be more lucrative), but have a growing food business on my hands. I'm certainly not complaining - really, anything that brings me more money to buy stuff like a dryer makes me happy - but sometimes I feel out of place.

Now that I've hired a manager for the bakery, I have a bit more control of my time and I've recently been able to take on a bit of consulting work, which has turned out well, and I'm pumping the money into growing the bakery.

I think that's the optimal strategy I can follow for now. What do you guys think? I look forward to hearing your thoughts on my relatively twisted path.

To quote a great philosopher:

"Programming as a profession is only moderately interesting. It can be a good job, but if you want to make about the same money and be happier you could actually just go run a fast food joint. You are much better off using code as your secret weapon in another profession.

People who can code in the world of technology companies are a dime a dozen and get no respect. People who can code in biology, medicine, government, sociology, physics, history, and mathematics are respected and can do amazing things to advance these discipline."

Your application of programming in such an area makes you more interesting and creative - not less.

In many countries and cultures, "staying at home" till quite late is the norm (Italy, for example) with few or heavily shared expenses beyond personal possessions. Sometimes, the family home houses multiple generations and is merely passed down without everyone moving out.

I'm married with a kid and own a home now, but back in the days when I lived with my parents, even paying them a modest rent and share of utilities I could have "lived" on $500 a month without causing them much/any expense. Just. :)