Out here in The Real World, there is ALWAYS more work to do than time in the day/week/month/whatever. I'm not knocking grad school and beyond, which I know from experience is a heavy load. But it's a different kind of heavy load. Grad students and pot-docs are the few people you can hire to work 70+ hours/week on salary. You will not hire/retain a shipping clerk, comptroller, or receptionist under that scheme. Even if you squeeze 50/week out of them, there's easily 60 hours' work to be done in that same week. The 10+ just doesn't get done -- pushed off to when higher-priority things aren't in front of it (as if that time ever arrives).
And that's focusing on productivity, which typically isn't the main reason for these Internet crackdowns.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what's wrong with America. It hits people at different ages but eventually we all come to realize that 1.75 careers just isn't worth it.
Me?
Somewhere around 40. Three years later I'm no longer a SBO.
If any of you youngsters think it's worth it... think again. I happen to know a little bit of how Clive juggles his schedule to be a husband and father. Kudos to him for making it work but I say there's a better way. Not picking on him necessarily as he seems happy enough. But I think it's crazy and I'll never be there again.
SST ftw.
I call it the age of enlightenment. Came to me a year, year and a half ago. By the time you're in your 40's you have built up a great deal of life experiences - school, job(s)/career(s), renting and owning homes and vehicles, marriage, kids, taxes, health issues, et al.
Of course everyone's situation is different. But I look at things remarkably different today than I did even 10 years ago. And who knows, maybe 10 years from now I'll look back and see that I was full of *feces*. But I doubt it.