Tokyo day twentysomething

So here I am. It`s 3.30 am and I`m doing a shift in the lab with another 4.5 hours to go. I sit and read my book and occasionally glance up to make sure that the beam of atoms that we are sending at the surface is still strong enough. On a screen is a picture showing the atoms that we`ve collected that have bounced off the surface. Every 2 hours there`s a whoosh and a whirr as the detector moves along a bit to collect the atoms that have gone off in a slightly different direction. I don`t have much to do. I might have to flick a few switches and turn a few nobs. I`m reading the new Charlie Brooker book; a collection of his newspaper articles. My brain can only hand short stories and can only think about one subject for a few paragraphs. My day started at 8am. In the afternoon I had a `break` which involved Nicola and I in a mad three hour round trip across the Tokyo Megapolis to buy some souvenirs from Harajuku. Yesterday we got up early and trudged around for hours looking at Mt. Fuji. I`m knackered. Despite all this I wouldn`t want to be anywhere else right now. Because we`re getting data, which is why I`m here, and because I have a bag of mini doughnuts and a Royal Milk Tea from the vending machine.