Of tools and jerks

While we were in Cabo, for our anniversary my wife got to do the "dolphin encounter" where you get in the water, a dolphin kisses you, you "dance with the dolphin", it waves at you, splashes you, does a couple other tricks...really cool.

You will notice there is no picture; possibly because they have a form you must sign that says "No picture taking allowed." As you pass through the gate the guards helpfully remind you , "No picture taking is allowed." As you sit there waiting for your turn, they remind the people as a group, "No picture taking is allowed." As you walk up to the seating area (for those of us watching, not participating) there is a giant sign that says "No picture taking is allowed in the Dolphin Experience area."

If I did not know better, I would think they did not want you to take pictures...

So sure enough we get up there and two inconsiderate illiterate ladies sitting in th front row pull out photography devices.

The first has a zoom lense approximately six feet long...a bit overkill since we were about 20' back. The other had an old-school video camera the size of a small cruise ship.

Nothing like being extremely obvious about your idiocy inability to notice and follow simple instructions.

And to be fair, it is soon obvious why the request is made; they do a fantastic job of A) videotaping the entire thing and B) taking numerous pictures of each individual with the dolphin and then selling them for ridiculously high reasonable prices when you consider the quality of the pictures and the memory they will provide.

Anyway, one guy in the croud makes a point of telling them "No photography allowed." When they either did not hear him or ignored him since he was just another watcher, not someone whose job it was to tell them or just ignored him because they were trying to take special pictures was irrelevant.

What was relevant was that he made a point of getting their attention and making a big stink about no pictures being allowed. You would have thought it was HIS livelihood that was being affected by their illicit activity.

Unless you noticed that as soon as they put their photography equipment away he whipped out his smart phone and surreptiously, holding it down by his side, proceded to photograph and video the thing himself.

He was trying to be sneaky...holding it down by his leg, pretending to be checking messages, etc...but it was pretty blatant to anyone over the age of 5 or iq of 6 or more what he was doing.

And suddenly his formerly acute hearing and ability to notice everything going on around him disappeared as he conveniently managed to "miss" the photographers whose livelihood actually WAS being affected by his scofflawery (Yeah, I made up that word...but you know you will be using it tomorrow) told him thrice that no photography was allowed.


In other words...his point of telling the women no photography was allowed was a "ploy" to allow him to sneak photograph it without them drawing attention to him.

Tool.

And it reached levels ot toolocity seldom seen when the security guard came over to stand directly in front of him and tell him no photographs were allowed. It went something like this.

"Sir, no photographs are allowed. You will need to delete those."

"huh?"

"No photographs are allowed. You will have to put your phone away."

"Oh, I didn't know that. Sorry."

"Sir, you have to stop taking pictures."

"I don't have a bag to put it in."

Whoa, wait a second...what, pray tell, does having or not having a bag to put your phone in have to do with your ability to refrain taking pictures? I really did not like this guy.

The security guard extended his hand. "Then I will have to take your phone until the show is over."

The dim bulb brightened. "Oh, I guess I could put it in my pocket."

It is people like that who make people like me not like people very much. What a tool.

For the record, I am going to go out on a limb and suggest he did not, in fact, delete the photos he stole.