What should I do about my work situation?

I've been at my job as a research yst for a group of ysts specialized in studies of the oil & gas industry for almost 3 years now. Lately, I've been wondering where I am going with my career; how do I get promoted; why do I feel like I am still doing piece-meal work; where do I fit into the organization. A lot of these questions were raised in my annual review, but not discussed. At the time, it was mainly because I thought that I had a lot of answers to these questions. But it was also because my hiring manager appeared to be quite busy at the time. However, these questions did not go away, and in trying to establish a niche for myself, I brought up the possibility of doing work along my line of expertise but outside the business unit with my hiring manager. He did not understand why I wanted to do so, and was displeased with me since the beginning of this week. On Friday, I decided to try again with him. The conversation went a little like this - I apologized for not being clear with what I had said to him on Tuesday (now that I'm looking back, I realized that I should not have done so); my telling him that I don't feel like I am getting enough responsibilities/challenges at work; my telling him my motivation for doing work outside the business unit that aligns with my interest; questions about where I am supposed to go with my career here; that I am trying to work things out because I want to stay with the company; that I want to make something of myself in the company before going back to California; that right now, I feel like I have no future with this job, and that I feel like I am getting no where. He told me that I need to be more ertive; I need to communicate better; I should aim to become a general yst to take a significant chunk of work from a project and work on that. But throughout the entire process, I just get the feeling that he thought that the whole process was more a hle than anything else. For instance, when I asked him, "Where am I supposed to be 5 years from now? I know a lot of that depends on me." And he responded, "That's right. I don't know . . . in 5 years - you can be a project manager; help us win some work; become an expert of something. Do you see yourself doing that?" Before I could respond with, "I need to decide which subject matter that I've worked on is most interesting to me," he cut me off short and said, "I think that you need to decide on what you want to do." That was the course of our conversation, and even though we had talked, I knew that he was irate and irritated with me. I have several questions - what do I need to do to get on his good side again? I feel like I should just ask him if he needs help (which is always what he wants to hear). And I feel that whereas he had a high opinion of me before, he now has the lowest opinion of me ever. I feel like I need to just walk into work tomorrow with a "can-do" and "will-do" attitude, and just put all of this behind me. Also, I feel like I need to start implementing a lot of the things that he has told me during our meeting. And of course, actions will speak louder than words and that everything will be all right again at the end of the year. Any advice, insights, encouragements? They'd all be appreciated. Thanks!