re: the gear hustle: if it makes you feel any better, I wrote all of my best music when I was in college, and all I had was a $30 Samick guitar from craigslist, a cheap USB interface, some free VST synths, and a lot of emotions. Nowadays, I have a nice job which lets me buy stuff like a real analog synth and a $200 midi keyboard, but all the new capabilities means I'm now a total novice in figuring out how to use my tools to get the sound I want, and my nice job means I have very little time/motivation to build up that expertise - so my music is less frequent and less inspired, even though I have better gear. IMO, unless your skill level reaches the point where you're limited by your tools, nicer gear (with some exceptions - learning to play on a crappy instrument comes to mind) is almost more like a music-related hobby than a real aid to the music creation process.
exactly