Day 29: How this all works

To answer a question from the audience, this is how my job works.

The National Marine Fisheries Service (the people who use my data) only allows their scientists to be deployed for 90 days before they have to come back to Anchorage, AK or Seattle, WA and get their data 'debriefed'. Apparently this entails them asking you about every number you have written down over the past 90 days so they know how accurate each piece of data is.

The joke among observers is that we have a 90 day work week with a weekend that lasts until our money runs out. At that point you call up your company and tell them you would like to work again.

My 90 days started June 7th so I am expected to be shipped back to Seattle at the beginning of September. After that I am spending the fall in Friday Harbor, WA doing biological research at Friday Harbor Laboratories.