Fox, that's good to hear that you are a full-timer at Accu-weather. Good luck, its always a pleasure to hear you wise words.

S_M, you will do well to listen to the advice here. I hope I can also add a little. I have been a member of this architectural/engineering industry for about 4 years now. We are about the same age, and have had similar experiences with education. I don't have a degree either, I dropped out for a lack of money and a debtload which I foolishly buried myself into.

Not every company is bad, sometimes it takes a while to get the right fit. One thing I learned early on is there is a certain mentality among some firms who do a lot of bidding. A company, I used to work for always hired the lowest bidder. I happened to be desperate enough for the job, to accept less money than what I felt was worth. One thing I insisted on was that they pay me more, if I worked out after 6 months. After 6 months they gave me an employee review. I scored excellent in all areas. Then my Boss got up to leave, when I said there was something he was forgetting. He didn't want to give me a raise, but I pressed him for it and did get one. It wasn't much. After that I realized all they cared about was getting low-bid employees. At that point I began looking elsewhere.

Luckily I found a firm which I found to be a perfect fit philosophically as well as professionally.

Looking for a job really bites. Its on my list of things I hate to do most. I feel for your predicement, and hope you are able to pull yourself up by the bootstraps and get back into the game.

Good Luck to you,

Steve