Monday, April 4, 2011

Air and Space Museum - Helen vs. Tour Guide

On Sunday afternoon, we visited the Air and Space Museum near Dulles. It's a huge airplane hangar, with several planes that you can look at and say "someone actually flied in that thing?". And of course, there's a collection of many other planes that actually appear safe. On one wing, it also has a space shuttle. The space shuttle is enormous, and not unlike witnessing David up close for the first time. Wow.

After touring the museum, we went up into a tower akin to where an air traffic controller works. Think: No light! Lots of computers!

The floor above this, which you can also walk around, allows a 360 degree view of the area around the museum, which includes Dulles airport. Planes approach non-stop, and it's pretty cool to watch.

There's a tour guide that talks about planes landing and tosses out somewhat random, flight-related facts. At one point, he asked the crowd "I'm thinking of a word that is five letters long, and it is not 'pilot'. What makes an airplane fly?" Without missing a beat, Helen responded "wings". And, for the record, not one other person - almost all of whom were adults - made any response at all. She was uncharacteristically quiet with her answer, so I said loudly "she just answered 'WINGS'", and with that, you could see all of the adults counting "1, 2, 3, 4, 5" in their heads as they confirmed it was a five-letter word. I actually thought Ed had prompted Helen, but he informed me that he hadn't said anything to her. The tour guide about fell over when he realized this tiny being had answered his question. He then asked Helen the follow-up question "can you name an animal that flies?"

Helen paused, thought for a moment, and responded "butterfly".

I love that girl.

Elaine

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