Well, darn if the week doesn't fly by.  This week has been interesting.  I actually finished one of the projects that I was working on...it was fairly detailed and I am ashamed to say, but I actually threw away all the coding I had done on the site 3-4 times because I wasn't getting it exactly the way I wanted to and when I tried to do a pull request from git so that I could go back to the previous code that worked (and I didn't ask for help) I messed up my branch and kept getting errors saying that the master was three commits ahead of what I was trying to commit...not a fun error.  And to top it all off, I asked for some assistance with some stuff not realizing that the reason something didn't work in Terminal was that the computer I was using to start the code was a MacBook Air...and although they are great, they don't have the power to finish all the projects that I am doing, so I went to a MacBook Pro.....unfortunately, I was trying to go back to the first project that I had done and realized that the errors were totally my fault since I changed computers in the middle of everything....3-4 days back and forth about it and it was a hardware NOT a software error....AAARRRGGGHHH!!

Learning to code is very fun, but I have to tell you that it is not easy.  Things seem to be getting easier and what I've found is that repetition is the key...don't stop to take notes and go a day or two without coding, code every day and it will start to become like second nature to you.  I never felt I would be able to use Terminal without messing up my entire computer, but I am literally becoming an expert at it and it feels wonderful!

My kids still aren't sure that this is the thing for me.  I've never really been an individual contributor, I've always had a management position in every previous job I've had, and I tried to help all the people that worked for me move their careers ahead while I was moving mine.  I felt great doing it...unfortunately, when push came to shove, none of those people were around for me...so I decided to combine still being able to work with people (group projects, planning, etc), but be responsible to and for me and only me.  I know it's the right decision and it will get me and my family to the point we want to be in the next 5 years, but it's going to take a lot of hard work and dedication to get there..in addition to patience on my part to realize that my code is not always going to be perfect right out of the gate, that I do have a learning curve, even though I've previously coded in SAS, SQL, and done some data-mining, also in SAS(yes, went to their Cary, NC site for training, it was incredible), and that if I keep going and moving I will eventually get to where I want to be. 

Anyway....back to ruby on rails....