I call it "The One-One Shuffle"

One forward: Get fish.
One back: Find out you have the wrong sex ratio.

One forward: Get heaters to start warming up aquarium water to appropriate "making babies" temperature.
One back: Discover photoperiod timer doesn't actually work and that fish have been in constant light for a month.

One forward: Finally get department chair to investigate how much research money is in your account.
One back: Department chair discovers you and another research fellow have mistakenly been put on the same account JUST BEFORE he leaves for the entire week of Spring Break just to come back to two weeks of managing job candidates and doesn't have time to straighten it all out.

One forward: Get 100 fish preserved to start character analyses.
One paused: Have to wait for department chair's time to free up so he can teach you the imaging software.

Gotta love science!!