In a word, yes. Is there an implication that work should be fun and fulfilling so as to make me happy? Work does not make me happy. It affords me the money I n

In a word, yes. Is there an implication that work should be fun and fulfilling so as to make me happy? Work does not make me happy. It affords me the money I need to keep my family healthy and safe. Happiness comes from within: art, literature, mathematics, science, family, friends... life. I just make money by selling some portion of my waking life to the pursuits of others by helping them realize their ideas in software. The ideas I have are just not marketable. My curiosity hasn't led me to dream about ways I can extract rents from financial tools or make advertising more profitable. I find myself to have more in common with Donald Knuth or John Conway than Larry Ellison or Bill Gates. If I could find a way to work with hard, fundamental problems or pursue hunches that may have no fiscal utility I'd be happy as a clam at high water. Alas I never had the privilege and opportunity to pursue a career in academia and, given what I understand of the current climates there, probably wouldn't find it fulfilling either. So I content myself with tinkering and following my own hunches and try to maximize the dollars-per-hour exchange I make so I can spend less time with the mundane world of markets and value and return to the land of whimsy. Update To clarify, I don't want to put myself in the same esteem as my heroes, Knuth or Conway. What I do find in common with them is a curiosity and propensity for selecting problems merely because they are interesting and with disregard for external factors such as economic utility.