In research, many times your collaborators will lead you in the wrong direction. They obviously mean well. However, they do not understand the intricate details of your experiment. Perhaps you used a pipetter instead of a graduated cylinder. Maybe you used a to deliver graduated cylinder instead of a to hold one. All these small details make a difference in the overall quality of your experiment.

Sometimes people who have studied Botry are giving the Chlorella researchers advice. Although the species are very similar, the experimental procedure and media added have subtle shades of difference. Either way, that thing that your graduate student told you to do- yeah that's wrong. Of course, you might just bend to their will because if you're wrong and they are right then you look like a jackass, idiot, and various other unpleasant things. If they are wrong and you went along with it, well then it was really just an honest mistake.

Look at it this way: either your graduate student was right and you feel bad about yourself, you were right and they "feel bad" but don't actually care as much because it wasn't their experiment, or you were wrong and they make you feel bad about yourself. Don't you love it when people think they know more? And sure they do, but about what they have seen and proceeded with. Who can really understand your experiment besides you and maybe that little frosh that you roped into helping you with it because it has way too many hours.

Oh well - going to the farm this weekend (I think/hope) to do construction work on the greenhouse/go swimming/camp out/bond with Rob (not that I haven't done enough of that over the last two weeks. I feel bad that I don't remember all the stories he's told me... Whoops. But someone needs to give me some credit, the man told me stories from his childhood to college years... that is way too many years to keep track of considering.