QUESTION:
When you guys do your work do you enjoy it?

ANSWER from Wendy Whiting on May 20:
Overall, I enjoy my work very much.  It is nice to be working
with a unique facility like the KAO.  We are the only airborne
astronomical observatory in the world, and we're very proud of the
work we do.  

I'm guessing that what you really want to know is whether we enjoy the 
actual KAO flights.  The typical KAO flight takes off around dusk and 
lands seven and a half hours later.  The environment in the cabin is
not all that comfortable, as it is noisy and can be cold.  We all
wear headsets throughout the flight, which helps to protect our
hearing and to communicate since it's so noisy.  All this combines to
make the flights somewhat stressful!  However, at the end of a successful 
flight, I usually feel a real sense of accomplishment at having
reached the goals we set out to achieve.  And that's a great feeling!

Sometimes people tend to think that this work must be very glamorous and 
exciting all of the time.  While it is that way sometimes, we also have 
lots of regular, everyday types of work to do.  My office is in the KAO 
hangar,  and on days when I'm not flying I spend my time on activities 
such as planning for expeditions, or working on other administrative or 
engineering projects.

In summary, I have to say my work for NASA on the KAO is very interesting 
and absorbing, and enjoyable.


ANSWER from Dave Koch on May 24:
Subject: Do we enjoy our work?

Yes we love it.  
In fact I remember once a Professor that I worked for who told me people
thought he was strange.  They found it unusual for someone who actually 
looked forward to getting back to work on Monday after a weekend.

I really do like my work and I really don't think of it as work.  This is
really something that to me is fun.  Work is something you have to do because
either someone is telling you what to do and they are willing to pay you
for the result or out of shear survival you do work so someone pays you 
money that you need for a living.

Scientists are lucky in that we get paid to do what we enjoy.  It is kind of 
like having a hobby and someone pays you to work on your hobby.  It's kind of
like a professional sports player or musician but even better.  
Many scientists actually get to pick the research that they want to work on.  
This is true for most scientists at universities and not-for-profit 
laboratories.

However, most scientist work in industry where the motivation is not to do what
we call "basic research" but rather perform what is called "applied research".
This can be enjoyable as well, but most of the time you do not get to pick the 
research topic yourself, many times you are told this is what we have to find
out right now.

In either case, research is fun because you get to make discoveries that no one
has ever come up with before.  This is my primary satisfaction: that after I am
dead and gone I will have left behind for all future generations a piece of 
knowledge that did not exist before and which will be of interest to untold 
numbers of others.

My research project right now is to look for planets around other stars.  
No one has ever been able to find another Earth-like planet beyond our 
solar-system.  We hope that we will be able to do that.  
Now doesn't that sound exciting?