Based on my experiences today (and many other days) I wanted to share a phenomenon common to the postgraduate experience. That's the concept of time dilation. Now as a physicist I could try to be clever here and tie an analogy to a particular aspect of relativity, but I'll spare you the artistic and clever prose. The point I do want to make is how quickly a day goes by. I was in the lab for over 12 hours today, and yet it doesn't feel like it! Now this is where you assume I'll brag about how much I love my work, but that's not my message either. The point is that even the smallest of jobs take heaps of time. If I were to set my watch (which I don't wear because I work around huge magnets) based on the time it took me to get things done in the lab, I'd be shopping for Christmas 2011.
To some the deliberate and methodical pace of a PhD might be exhausting, but the reality is producing a thesis is a protracted process. As such, on the time scale of hours or a day it's difficult if not impossible to see any progress.
Again, today's post was only to share my experience, not complain about any specifics. For now, I am happy with the progress I am making, one step at a time.
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