Winging It at the Museum

First, I can't believe that I missed the "CSI: The Experience" exhibit when it stopped at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. I remember when they announced it, and I had every intention of going. Well I never did. Well, I decided to give my membership card some exercise today and pay a visit. I had already seen the "Lucy's Legacy" exhibit (a very, very good one) so I got a ticket for "Leonardo da Vinci: Man, Inventor, Genius."

To be honest, I wasn't highly impressed. It was basically Leonardo's inventor's notebook made into scale models. But when I entered I was told that it was an interactive exhibit, and I could only remember two machines that the public was invited to try. One was an Archimededs screw that was supposed to carry water up a slope, but the trough was drained dry. The second was a series of pulleys that was supposed to demonstrate the multiplication power of using multiple pulleys. But thanks to friction issues I could see in the model, it seemed like the single pulley was actually the easier one to work with.

It seemed as if Leonardo spent a lot of time thinking about flight, and if he wasn't doing that (or art), he was thinking about conducting war on land and sea:






After last year's extravagant stroll through the mind and life of Benjamin Franklin, I felt as if this exhibit didn't really capture the imagination of its subject as well. Admittedly, that was a tough act to follow.

After the Leonardo Da Vinci exhibit, I saw Dinosaurs 3-D in the IMAX theatre. With lots of scenic images of the Patagonia area, an Argentinian paleontologist talked about his passion for the big lizards that once walked his country. The film ends with the suggestion that the dinosaurs didn't go completely extinct, but that we are left with their beauty and grace in the form of birds. (I'll think about that the next time I order at Popeye's Fried Chicken and Biscuits.) Personally, I think we can more easily see the dinosaur legacy more clearly in crocodiles than birds.

It's been a permanent part of the museum for years, but until today I had never been in the Cockrell Butterfly Center. So out of curiosity I bought a ticket and was pleasantly surprised. Basically, this is a three-story greenhouse with an tropical rainforest inside. Swarming everyone and everything are hundreds and hundreds of butterflies.







In the adjoining building there are some nifty interactive exhibits about insects in general. I'm sure kids really love it. But as I was ascending a staircase with a score of red and black butterflies circling my head in formation, all I could think about was how this would be a nice spot to start something romantic. I see why some people are choosing this spot for weddings.

The other big change I noticed is that the museum remodeled so that there's a direct path into the parking garage -- which goes right through the relocated gift shop. Obviously, someone with the museum got some retail smarts!