Pet projects need not take up all of your time. All you need is a few hours every so often — an evening or so once every couple of months, or one weekend a year

Pet projects need not take up all of your time. All you need is a few hours every so often — an evening or so once every couple of months, or one weekend a year would set you head and shoulders above a lot of people. The whole thing of dark matter developers with no pet projects at all, versus "passionate programmers" who eat, sleep and breathe code, is a completely false dichotomy. All employers are looking for is some publicly available evidence that you actually have the skills that you claim to have listed on your CV.