I hear you on the necessary tediousness of doing science. I worked in a drug testing lab for a couple of years and all it took was for one sample to be mixed up or out of order and the whole thing needed to be done again.

Then I spent years performing modeling and simulation - same thing could happen. After weeks of running an experiment, I'd analyze the data to find the inputs were wrong or someone didn't create the right executable with the proper models...well it happens.

But we keep going because what's the other choice? Oh yeah, quit and become a freelance writer. That's what I did!

I'm still a scientist though and always will be.