Ask HN: starting a career in software dev in my thirties, am I nuts?

ok, so here's the rub;

I am technically minded, I did my first degree in Elec. Eng, which I finished in 2000, and was exposed to some programming.

I spent 5 unfulfilling years in tech support at a big global company, then went travelling for a few years, then came back and did a software degree in 8 months at the age of 30 (due to the fact that I already had exposure, they allowed me to skip some credits). I came out with a high 2nd class honours from this, which I felt was pretty good considering the amount I had to learn.

Since I graduated in 2008, I opted not to jump into the first job that came my way, and instead started studying Ruby on Rails, jQuery, and more recently BDD with Rspec and Cucumber, as well as working on some projects and building wordpress sites in between for a little extra cash. The idea was that this time around I would get work that interested me instead of going through the motions.

Recently I've been looking for employment, and haven't been successful, although feel as though I have come close once or twice.

Still, I'm starting to get a sinking feeling. I don't have enough experience to get started, and I can't get started without experience. It's starting to get me down a bit. I'm 33 now, and I need to start my career already.

I would love to know what insight you guys have for me in this situation.

cheers

Paul