Day to day life of a professional astronomer

[DHF]

Greetings,

My wife and I are currently in the process of writing our next book, the main character of which will be an
astronomer. So far my research has given me plenty of resources on astronomy itself but very little on the actual astronomer. I would love to get some insight on what the day to day life of a professional astronomer looks like. What are the various jobs one can do in astronomy? what does the field look like from a career standpoint?

At this point we have the main character working at the Hayden Planetarium, if anyone has experience working there, that would be gold. However this is not a major point of the book and can be altered if a more appropriate workplace can be found.
I look forward to hearing from all of you.

 

[jedishrfu]

For the Hayden Planetarium I suspect most jobs will be related to running the place and handling the visitors:

http://www.amnh.org/our-research/hayden-planetarium/about-us

One area where an astronomer would be needed is in developing the shows on display or in developing new exhibits but even then its most likely a media specialist would be doing the actual work with an astronomer available for consultation.

http://www.amnh.org/our-research/hayden-planetarium/staff

Here's a reference for what astronomers may do:

http://astronomy.swin.edu.au/~dforbes/mercury.pdf

 

[robphy]

[sorry... had to make this pun] The day-to-day life of an astronomer is always looking up!

http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/epo/powerpoint/life.as.an.astronomer.pdf [last page is funny]