If you think that working at your current job is a horror show, here's a provocative idea -- why not make it a double feature?

The concept here is called "moonlighting," and if the name conjures up images of romance and roses, you've been loading up your Kindle with too many Daniel Steele novels. As a moonlighter you have one full-time job -- your daylight gig -- to which you add a second job, which you work "by moonlight."

Why would you take on a second job when your first job is sufficiently demeaning and miserable? Cutbacks and salary freezes are what motivated The New York Times reporter, Eilene Zimmerman, to tackle the subject in a recent Career Couch column.

The extra income a moonlighter can earn does come with extra stress and personal sacrifices, the reporter reports. "Ask yourself what tradeoff you are willing to make for that second income in terms of lost personal time, performance at your primary job and your stress level," suggests Eileen Blumenthal of Rocket Science Coaching and Consulting.

Of course, there is also stress when you move your family into a refrigerator box under the freeway. But, at least, you do not have to sacrifice valuable drinking time, or be forced to miss new episodes of "The Cougar," simply because you are working the graveyard shift at the local Arby's.

Maynard Brusman, of Working Resources, suggests that before you take on the extra responsibility of an extra job you "Re-evaluate your spending habits. Are there other options -- can you take a roommate? Is your spouse working?" The idea is a fine one, but quite impractical. I asked my spouse if we could rent a room to a very talented young dancer from the Kit Kat Klub, a tight squeeze to be sure in our pied-a-terre, but no problem at all if the spouse took Brusman's advice and took a job, preferably with the U.S. Embassy in Uruguay. I won't tell you my spouse's response, but it is rather depressing how some people just refuse to think out of the box...or out of the country.]

"The best second jobs add to your professional skill set," consultant Blumenthal suggests, citing one of her clients working in the banking sector who "recently took a second job as a yoga teacher." Continued...