gainful

This morning I was musing about the word gainfully. Why are people "gainfully employed" and not just employed?

So I looked up the word gainfully. It means having gain. Yeah, no kidding. Not very helpful. So then I looked up gainful. Here it is (drum roll please):

producing gain; profitable.

I guess if you are ungainfully employed you're working a job that is not very profitable. Anyone feel that way? Ha!

Well, I was thinking that I am gainfully unemployed. Yes, I'm working on making some life profit. That's a philosophical way of saying, "I'm going broke." Really, there are some advantages to not having a job. Like, today I was thinking of finishing my eight hour trip home from my friend's wedding (I stopped half-way to sleep at my sister's house), but I changed my plans so that I could meet some friends for lunch. Flexibility is nice.