Capturing The Stereotypical Moment

We went to NASA and acted touristy all day today. I felt a bit silly taking the same photographs everyone else who ever went to NASA also took, but I did get a couple of winners (if they turn out well in processing). The Red Telephone on an empty Control Room command station desk. Birds on a wire that held up a rocket, pecking at each other. People standing in the blast zone of rocket engines. My favorite picture of the day was taken twice, in a vain attempt to get a nice standard tourist shot.

I had been walking #3 around showing him the sights with three year-old appropriate commentary, and we were almost done for the day when a couple of JSC employees walked through. One was an elbow-grabber/guide for the other who could not hear and probably could barely see. The other was walking around in a fool-a-first grader moderatly-cheesy gen-u-wine SPACEMAN SUIT zOMG GETAPICTURE!!!1! So the Zoo lined up in front of the "astronaut" who gave a lame thumbs up or something for the two-hundredth time that day. #1 and #2 stood and faced the camera, smiling like good little tourists. #3 was incorrigible. He stood there in front, turned 3/4 away from the camera, slack-jawed, staring up at the "gold" face shield on this guy's costume helmet. The elbow-grabber and #1 and #2 all told him he was not being a good stereotypical Say Cheeser, and he was physically rotated to face the camera. By the time I could get a second shot off, it didn't work and he was back to the astonished gaping at the spaceman's helmet. We laughed at the whole situation and called it a photo.

I wished many, many times that I had brought my work camera. I'm going to have to sell some stuff and get a real camera.

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In related news, how jaded am I? I was standing there photographing genuine world history and thinking about the fact that there are a million other photos unlooked-at on hard drives around the world, taken by other tourists in exactly the same circumstances.