[roundandround]

I've known a quite few people who dropped out of tech around the dotcom bust and I've not really had a very normal continuous career..

As afar as manual labor and car(?) travel, I would recommend against doing that without a specific trajectory in mind that you've already been working on. For example if you will be transitioning to more of a lifestyle as an owner of coffee shops.

Most people I know who went into the trades and stayed had pretty good advantages compared to ones that were really looking for anything open to an entry level worker.