About a year before I bought my digital camera I had two events that I would have given anything to have been able to photograph.
1) When that piece of Russian space junk came down over the eastern seaboard I was lucky enough to have witnessed its re-entry over Washington D.C. It was the second most amazing thing I had ever witnessed in the sky.
2) About a year before that, I had the distinct pleasure of witnessing a cloud formation. It was at sunrise and the only clouds in the whole sky comprised this. It was a fully represented image of a Phoenix flying into the sun. I would have given my arm to have captured it in some way.
Sadly, nothing has happened since I got my camera, but I keep it with me just in case.