(Follow-up to old post: New Life Plan Scared to Death)
Yesterday, I started volunteering at the local humane society 
. I feel so good about finally being able to do something towards my ultimate goal (working with animals). I told my boss that I did not get into grad school and about my new goals. We talked about the fact that I originally took this job because of the tuition assistance, but that I am not happy being an administrative assistant (I hate working on computers and am not technologically savvy and do not like compiling data). She was very understanding (I love my boss -she is awesome :)) and approved me for flex time to facilitate my volunteer work. This is generally an option reserved for employees taking classes. The pay is pretty decent at this job, with lots of state-employee perks -I plan to stay until life is a bit more figured out.
I applied for pretty much the only job at the university that would enable me to work with animals, but did not get hear anything back (not surprising, I suppose, given my lack of any sort of related experience). I think it is OK though, since I think I would have found working with lab animals to be heart-breaking.
Also, it would have been a significant decrease in pay, which might be OK at some point, but very hard right now. We are still unsure of what is going on with any of our other circumstances. We still want to move and are thinking about Vegas, but there are some significant family financial circumstances that should be determined this year, which could very definitely have a significant impact on our finances. Basically, we are still stretched pretty thin, but are trying to maintain the status quo until circumstances break one way or the other. Anyway, I feel good about being able to do SOMETHING to move towards my goal until we are no longer in a period of such intense limbo. Thanks for letting me share, Doper friends! Any other suggestions or advice are welcome.
P.S. I have also started submitting articles for a ferret publication that needed volunteer writers. Feels good to be exercising those writing muscles prior to beginning my book 
.