Note - I am now fully booked up until June, after which I will start charging again, please do get in touch however, as we can likely work something out that balances the wants of below, with the needs of a lifestyle that unfortunely does seem to cost money
After a productive weekend in Vilnius at the "We Actually Build Stuff" conference, I came back to the client I have been spending most of my time with in Belgium these past two years feeling a bit despondent.
Why was I still there? I had already made my intent clear a month ago - that after this contract expired I wasn't going to renew, I had saved enough money to survive for a year if need be, I was not exactly enjoying what I was doing (for many of the standard self-defeating enterprise issues) and as one of my friends put it "Staying just to save some extra cash just seems like a stupid idea if you're not enjoying it"
So I went in, found myself unable to function any more and decided to expediate the process of leaving, kindly they came to an agreement and I was able to head off providing I reply to a few e-mails :-).
Many folk have already offered that I come and take a job with them, and while their hearts are in the right place, I wish to make it known that this is not what I want to do for the next couple of years.
I actually have some semi-concrete plans next year that will make all of this happen, this will take a few months to put into place though and in the meanwhile I have an offer for YOU, if you are interested and feeling brave.
I am offering the following two things
I will come and spend a few days (1-2 weeks) at your workplace (in Europe), building stuff for expenses and a roof over my head
Seriously, I don't have much to do (I have a few paid commitments which will take priority, but other than that plenty of time) and I want to help you Build Stuff, for FREE.
Of course you are perfectly welcome to toss me a few euros for my time as well, but whatever, money is not important for the next few months at least.
I can help you with your Javascripts, your .NETs and your NoSqls, I am especially interested in helping teams who are new to JS get to grips with it quickly, I am very intersted in discussing difficult migration paths from legacy code (such as Silverlight for example).
If you are building games, then I am especially interested in coming to say hello, even if you're in somewhere boring like Guildford ;-)
I will cook you a curry for a roof over my head
Coupled with the first offer, if you're the developer putting me up then I'll cook you a curry, I'm pretty practised at this and can tailor this to your tastes if asked - this is a serious offer, I love cooking and I love coding - what is better than combining the two.
Anyway, if either of these appeal to you, get in touch at robashton@codeofrob.com or twitter @robashton
My availability can be seen publicly at google calendars
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