Satisfaction

I've been trying to do an experiment with particularly difficult technical issues for, oh, three months. There have been some other experiments interspersed, but this has been the Sisyphean task. I've made little bits of progress here and there, optimizing parameters to advance the technique, rolling the boulders a little further uphill, but never gotten the key N = 1.

Until today.

I had a hunch this would be the week it happened, but then again I had that hunch last week too, only to be crushed by unexpected problems in a successful, yet unsuccessful, experiment. So best not to read too much into my hunches.

I needed it, too. Yesterday was rough for reasons I'll perhaps talk about another time, and also I was starting to get the feeling that my Advisor was wondering if I would ever pull this thing off. I was wondering the same thing, so I can't blame him, but his confidence in me has been supremely reassuring over the last few months, and I didn't want to lose it.

So, yay! And, phew.

And now to get Ns 2 through 5.