Juggling 4 "jobs": Work, School, Band Game Dev

The more and more i delve into coding, whether it be for work (C, Visual Basic) or for video games, (C++, UnrealScript, Source Entity Configs) the more and more i feel that i’m in the wrong field. Well... maybe not in the wrong field per-se, but i definitely LOVE coding. It’s such a rewarding challenge. I also love using 3-D software for modeling. But somehow i feel that it’s too late to just do it all over and go into video game development. Hopefully i can refine my skills on my free time and produce something worthwhile and make some money - maybe enough to go back and get a proper education.

I have no regrets of the path i have taken thus far, but sacrifices must be made. Right now i am doing 4 things: Working full time, Going to school part-time, developing a mod part time, trying to finish the band’s second album. Work takes up 40+ hours of my day, and definitely takes away from the time i can spend working on the other 3 at home. Unfortunately it’s my number 1 priority because without it i cannot support myself. Even though i currently live with my mom, i still need that job to pay for everything i have, and bills ect. I NEED to stop spending money if i want to pursue my goals.
School is great. I’m going towards my Electrical Engineering Tech. BS degree, and hopefully after that is done i can take the bridge program and get my Electrical Engineering Masters degree - that would be nice. But it requires money and time. Both of which I’m very short on. Maybe next semester i should start searching for classes sooner and i may be able to squeeze in 3 classes after work instead of just 2. Now I’m on a tight schedule as it is and i don't even have any homework.. Maybe that’s not such a good idea... but again i just need to sit down and think about it all - pros and cons - like an engineer.
As for developing the mod, this is where my passion right now lies. I didn't get off to a good start, but i have proved my worth thus far to the mod leader and he has given me credit for it. I need to learn the unreal engine better so i can get some decent work done. The better i am at using the tools, the more efficiently i can create content, and the better it will look. If we want this mod to be professional looking, i need to dedicate some serious time to learning how to map for unreal. The unfortunate thing about that is i need to also learn how to model better. Seeing as how unreal is amazingly efficient with rendering and lighting models, 90% of the world is such, and only 10% is BSP / terrain. Don has agreed to coach me through the modeling process which i appreciate but its still hard. Its a challenge, but a challenge i love tackling. I love creating, i love seeing my thoughts come to fruition. But i have felt such a creative block over the last year+ that just creating anything new is extremely difficult. I need to get one of those huge sketch pads and just sit and draw. I feel that once my ideas are on paper, everything will then come together... Hopefully.
Now about the band. There’s nothing i love more than spending time with the guys, or being on stage, or just writing a song that i love so much that i play it to myself until i fall asleep. But the older we all get(the guys in the band), the more i start to realize that the music industry is just a bunch of bullshit. And its tough thing to realize, but my dreams of touring the country with another band playing gigs and getting paid will probably never come true. Yes, we can all spend money on the album, promote it, sell it to our friends and family, but the simple fact of the matter is that unless some random music executive sees our shit and likes it than we’re not going anywhere, and after we sell the first 50 copies of the album, the rest are going to sit in my bedroom and collect dust; just like the first one we put out did. Granted, the first album is absolutely terrible, and we’re actually 4x better musically than we were 5 years ago, i still don't see us even having a remote shot at getting a record label. The chances drop off even more because we never practice. Singer is in florida still, and will probably stay there after he graduated. Bass and Drums are up here, but all 3 of us have jobs and rarely get the chance to practice - not to mention that the time we do get to practice i’m usually spending time with Courtney and then i have to make a choice between the two; band practice, or chill with the girlie. - which tears me apart. She understands but i know she wants to spend time with me.

Ugh

Another thing that makes juggling 4 different things hard is the fact that inspiration can strike anywhere, and for the most part, there’s no medium for me to express my ideas. I get ideas ALL THE TIME at work for game-play, map concepts, weapons, scripts, music, just general cool shit that i usually don't think about when actually creating those things. But i have a 6x8 notepad and a computer with very limited internet access so i can’t jot too many ideas down on paper, or even research further into the topic.Plus i’m at work and the whole reason for me being at work is to work. Imagine if my boss came into my cubicle and saw me drawing robots with guns on scrap paper. That's sure to bring me a raise. Speaking of robots with guns. I'm working on 2 mods at this point, but until Overlord gets back to me on compiling the Source code, that's not going anywhere..

Which brings me right back around to scripting. I love it. But i’d much rather be doing something else - like writing code that makes robots dissolve into little bits when shot at with a rocket launcher - or uranium-filled shotgun pellets. Yeah. That’ll be the day.