[fat0wl]

No regrets.... if you are going to suck up to traders to get in on their pile of gold, either commit to it or don't. I used to complain about code exams until i realized "this is how you prove you want/deserve the job.... if someone else can pass where i fail, that is not necessarily the hiring managers fault". if you cant answer their questions dont expect the job.... you either want it enough to fortify your defenses or you dont. Even if they are going to ask a bunch of redundant, irrelevant, easily Google-able crap -- not having an answer is going to beg the question "how come they never, out of curiosity or to impress people in my position, Googled this easily Google-able crap?"

i just dont think these environments r made for you or me...... i used to win many math comps and was at the top of my class for years & years. in college i went into media programming & psychology because i didnt really want to study stuff i thought was boring all day just to be a market kiss-ass

as a result, i have a pretty boring job but i let my mind wander creatively & still work on a ton of music & creative projects. I've designed some pretty sophisticated machine learning algorighms/research in audio signal processing but i don't get to study it all day because there is not much market demand.

i know i have more raw talent than most people i interact with (in fact im confident i can self-teach myself various technical disciplines to near-expertise) but i've also come to understand that employers don't care. beyond entry level, they are just looking for someone who says the right things and has already done work that resembles the job they are hiring for.

sometimes i consider self-teaching toward a goal like being a quant, but then i remember that that world is not for me. im not insanely greedy so its not a big deal. and though my enterprise work now is boring, there are several things on the horizon that seem much more promising & appealing than finance. i am accumulating skills & enjoying having room in my head for other thoughts. i don't work in the startup world because i haven't encountered anyone with compelling ideas but i suppose thats where people like me are destined to end up.... i stay sharp & am confident that i could code a mini-enterprise in a year, once i find the right idea.