Comment by scubasteve

Thanks for the response! I think one of the best lines of advice I've seen online was on Quora: "The language and technologies you learn are not the most important bit when it comes to becoming a programmer. When friends ask me whether they should learn Ruby or Python I respond by asking "Which language do more of your friends know?"" I think that's what keeps bringing me back to Rails, the support around it. I have the same problem as you, trying to find more than 5 hours a week to stick to reading Hartl's book. I think now that I have more time I'll try and go back through the book. Did you have any help with mentors along the way?