Lemme take your picture?

I hit on this brilliant idea, at a crop.  I would photograph my crop friends one by one and do a LO about them.  After all, they feature large in my life, I see most of them at least that once a month and when I tragically and years too early shuffle off this mortal coil, my daughter will be able to look back in awe at these women; they will doubtless have been significant role models.  Or horrible warnings.  I know which I'd rather be.   
Thing is, of the 12 or 13 regular croppers, this lovely Laura LO is only the second.  I can't easily get my modest crop friends to pose for me.  Actually, first problem is that originally I wanted candid, scrap-in-motion shots.  But I felt furtive and couldn't keep quiet about my brilliant idea.  So I came clean.  The Enthusiastic Educator was my first target and I love the photos I have of her.  For some reason, I have no photo of the LO.  And I can't show you without her permission. Or without getting off the chair and crossing the room.   I do understand any reluctance.  I arrive at crop having packed (you've heard masses about the angst of packing), sorted out my contribution to lunch and staggered around too early on a Saturday morning than is generally good for me.  All this adds up to a fat forty-blah woman with no make up.  Now I can't say I'd want you to take a picture of me like that really. And certainly not a candid one.  This would involve glasses balanced so that I can look down and see through them and look up without seeing through them - if you know the action, you'll picture the look.  And then there's the persistent chatting.  It means my mouth is always open.  Unless I'm eating.  I do have one or two manners intact.  My Sissy Stephanie who lives in California has developed a 'pause' type pose for cameras - whenever one is pointed at her: Eyes open, mouth shut.  It's ingrained in her now and I can't remember the last time she was caught out.  And I can't remember the last time I wasn't.  Laura has youth on her side, hasn't she...so when I pointed my phone at her (yes, phone...my packing skills just cannot accommodate a real camera as well), she simply leaned toward me and smiled.  Confident, huh.  I wonder who will display such confidence this Saturday?  Luckily, this isn't a group project or a circle journal, so it remains that I'll be safely behind the phone.  Camera.  And my crop friends will as always, be  v e r y  tolerant of my self assumed brilliance.