I hope I'm not stuck, but after a few months not working and an expensive cross-country move, I ended up taking a job working at a university with an old, messy

I hope I'm not stuck, but after a few months not working and an expensive cross-country move, I ended up taking a job working at a university with an old, messy codebase. It's really low-pressure, and if it turns into full-time the benefits would good. It pays just enough, but nothing like people are getting in SV right now. I'd rather do something more cutting-edge and more challenging, and I'd rather be around people who are a little more driven. However I've got the syndrome real good, I feel like "all those people with jobs I want are pro programmers who go write big, beautifully structured, complex software on the weekends for fun; I'm just a guy who knows some scripting stuff that can muddle through some bug fixes." So my plan is... work through some of the interview books, and try to find a personal project that's interesting enough to pursue. I have a hard time motivating to actually write software for myself, rather than for an employer.