Oy vey | Scene Through the Lens

When doing assignments over the past two years in Philadelphia’s Historic District or visiting the paper’s newsroom on Independence Mall, as a photographic exercise and a way to clear my mind, I would set a timer on my phone for 7.6 minutes (you know, for our big 1776 anniversary next year). Standing at the exact spot, diagonally across Market Street from the “OY/YO” sculpture by artist Deborah Kass outside the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History, I watched the pedestrians and traffic.

Inspired by the yellow car version of the classic kids-in-car driving game Punch Buggy, I wanted to see if I could get a picture of a yellow car — or umbrella or taxi cab — passing in front of the sculpture.

I didn’t want to spend all day doing it (I’ve done that before) so the 7.6 minutes seemed a good way to make the effort manageable. Every so often when I was in the neighborhood, which is a lot.

There have been plenty of close-but-no-cigar encounters. Once I saw a yellow car coming, but there was another car in front of it as it passed.

Another time, a sporty little yellow convertible zipped by but my spot that day was behind barricades set up for the Trump-Harris debate at the nearby National Constitution Center.

I have made a few other images, not all around my spot.

Now this is where you’re naturally expecting to see my payoff. The picture I got as a reward for patiently standing (for 7.6 minutes at a time) for the past 24 months. Nope. Instead I present an excellent image made just last week — a weather photo by my colleague Alejandro A. Alvarez.

I’ll keep trying. I realized while writing this that I’ve never stood there for my 7.6 minutes after dark. Stay tuned.

And, as promised, a link to a gallery of pictures from the Eagles’ big Super Bowl win - and my colleagues’ favorite images from the game.

» READ MORE: Photographers' favorites from Super Bowl LIX

Since 1998, a black-and-white photo has appeared every Monday in staff photographer Tom Gralish’s “Scene Through the Lens” photo column in the print editions of The Inquirer’s local news section. Here are the most recent, in color: