No two days are really the same. I get up at 8:00 AM and have breakfast, and by 9:30 I am at my office at the laboratory. I turn on the computer and check my email. I then work for the next 8 hours on one or usually more of the following tasks:
1...Writing a new research paper describing what I have just discovered.
2...Reviewing and editing a previous paper based on comments I got from
a referee assigned by the journal I submitted a paper to a month ago.
3...Continue with the manipulation of some data to put it in a form that I
need to advance my analysis of it. This can involve an accurate
measurement of the intensity of portions of an image; the identification
of 'point sources'; the calculation of temperatures by fitting various
forms of a so-called black body curve to the spectrum of the object.
4...Writing and debugging software to perform the calculations I mentioned
above.
5...Writing grant proposal requests to try to get money from NASA or other
agencies to support my research next year.
6...If I work at a college, there are various teaching responsibilities
such as planning the next lecture, reviewing student homework, consulting
with students and so on.
All of these things get done to various degrees each day. By the end of the day, usually 8-9 hours long, I am pretty tired and am anxious to get home and re-charge with the family. Because all of this work gets done in my head, it is very hard not to be thinking about various aspects of my work all the time, even when I am at home, washing dishes, mowing lawns or changing diapers.