> quitting my fully vested tech job to fuck off and be a cook for a while

I am also fantasizing about this and am only holding off from doing it because of the social stigma (what idiot would quit a well paid full-time job). My biggest issue with the software industry is the feverish shiny-new-thing syndrome that AI is causing (and my current company is all in on this, with "Hyper-Velocity Engineering" panels). Maybe I don't want to move at light speed and would rather stop and smell the roses.

pretty much every day I feel that tickling of “what the hell did I just do?”

but I don’t care. I put 15 years into my tech career. I am good at building software, and I will not let this ridiculous “resume gap” problem stop me from taking a break for my mental health. any tech employer that wouldn’t want me because of it is a place I wouldn’t want to work anyway.

also, to be honest, I’m writing more code now than I ever did in the last year of my tech job… working on a full CMS and custom website combo for my friends bar, such that I can copy that template over for future projects (want to help local businesses escape the bullshit machine). also building a cool web development desktop app. and more! I’m having a great time