Suspense!

This morning I woke up very excited and optimistic. I put on my clothes quickly and hurried to the lab. In the bus I was telling myself, "It must work this time. I'm trying several different parameters. I'm sure one of them will work. It's not important which one, but at least one would succeed. Then I'll have a door wide open for many further things to do ..." My thoughts went on, and my generally optimistic mood, mixed with anticipation and a touch of happiness was still there.

I ran to the lab, had a quick look at the gel. There's nothing to see yet, as it should be put in the decoloring solution first. But I was looking carefully, trying to find any clues, any faint shades of colors in the gel that may give away the yet hidden secret. But it was useless. I still had to wait for 30 more minutes. And I did.

At the end, I had a negative result. Nothing worked. It just didn't work!!

I guess there is no other job where one could have such an adrenalin kick, or live in such a thrilling suspense. And there's no other job where one enjoys such a dazzling excitement when it works. No wonder Eucledis ran around naked shouting "Eureka! Eureka!". That's why I love to do science. However, there's probably no other job where it is so infuratingly frustrating to fail or be wrong. Yet, I always tell myself, "perhaps I lost the battle but not the war. At least I learned one way how things can go wrong!"