I work at home, online, so I have a lot of the advantages of a retired person, but contract work is irregular at best. In the metaphor of the "goose hanging high," my goose's trajectory looks like a theme park roller coaster.

I'm fortunate right now to be working on a new rocket engine, a project that will hold out as long as the investment money does for the startup rocket company I'm working with. Wish I could post shiny pictures. Solidworks is a lot of fun to use.

Sometimes I wonder where I'd be right now if I'd come out of college to a world full of enthusiastic rocket companies, instead of one where there weren't any, and even NASA was mired between the end of Apollo and the beginning of Shuttle.

I also bring in a bit of pin money formatting books for small publishers, again working at home on my computer.

I'm still writing fiction of my own for young people. My first book was self-published a few years ago, and sales are less than spectacular. I have a middle-grade fantasy coming out from an actual small publisher soon, and maybe that will sell a bit better. The publisher put "Book 1" on the cover, which is both encouraging and a bit frightening since I don't actually have a "Book 2" yet. I have a third book done, on a completely different subject, but it's just sitting there for now. Thinking about doing that one myself again, but I'd have to be a lot more savvy about marketing.

My wife is retired now, sooner than she wanted to be due to health, and with a certain element of "slid out the door" involved. That's another story. Another advantage of working at home is that I'm there for her. She's doing well, especially since we put a stair lift in. Due to the twisty stairs, the lift is practically a theme park roller coaster on its own. Our main problem is finding a doctor of Pharmacy things that will still keep her brain active.

I still think you should be writing for publication. You put some good stuff up here, for only a handful of people. It should be out there in the wider world. It's like watching Roy Hobbs burning pitches on the family farm, and finding out he has no interest in playing baseball professionally.

By the way, can't you rent boats?