On Jan 28, 2025 I awoke to an email stating that Nuna (the company that I worked for) was dropping their core business and that I was laid off. I was neither surprised nor upset. The severance package included 2 months paid cobra and a lump sum payment covering 2 months salary. I figured that I’d spend a few days relaxing, and then catch up on leetcode, delve into AI a little bit more, and then start applying for jobs.

I definitely spent a few days relaxing, and I did start brushing up on AI, but I never really got around to applying for a new job. My friends told me that I should consider retiring while I’m still young enough to enjoy it. I checked with our finance people and they said that it wouldn’t be a problem, so I just stopped thinking about looking for a new job. I would consider taking a position if the right one dropped into my lap, but that seems pretty unlikely.

I’ve tried to think of some good ideas for projects that I can work on, but so far my ideas appear to already have good solutions. I’d be happy to help somebody out with their own projects (on a part time basis), but I might also look into doing some volunteer coding for a non-profit.

With that in mind, here are some of my career stats:

• Years worked professionally: 36 years, 1 month
• Number of jobs: 5
• Number of companies worked for: 6 (Pixel Semiconductor was bought by Cirrus Logic while working there)
• Number of jobs acquired through networking/friends:
  • 1 found entirely on my own (Niantic)
  • 3 found entirely through networking/friends
  • 1 that I am not sure how to classify. For my first job, my sister’s boyfriend told me to send him a resume that he’d pass it on to a friend, who’d pass it on to a hiring manager (which certainly seems like networking, but the people involved didn’t know me at all and couldn’t personally vouch for me).
• Most fun job: Niantic, but Pixel Semiconductor was a close second given the comradery of the very small startup.
• Most fun project: Virtualizing the GPU
• Least fun project: Hardware DRM (my co-workers were great, but other aspects were not)
• Number of times laid off: 1
• Total of gaps between jobs: < 2 months
• Money earned and saved for retirement: Enough (at least it should be – my timing is not great with the market crashing due to Trump’s new tariffs)

UPDATE: I was contacted by some friends (Piaw and Vermont) and they asked me to apply for a new opening at Aurora as a security engineer. The interviews went well and the team seems very good, so I start the new job on July 7, 2025. I will be working to secure self-driving trucks.