As-I-considered whether or not to venture out today, I remembered my Uncle Edward. Now, Uncle Edward is not truly my uncle. As is often the case on my mom’s side of the family, relatives are just referred to as ‘aunt’ or ‘uncle’ regardless of their true relationship to you.

My ‘Crazy Auntie Joyce’ and ‘Aunt Zona,’ for instance, are not actually my aunts, nor is ‘Uncle Herman Dick’ truly my uncle. (Those truly are their names, however.) Keeps things simple, I guess.

The reason I thought of Uncle Edward today had nothing to do with his dubious relation to me. I was thinking back to when he lived in Los Angeles. My mom called him because the Rodney King riots were in full effect. She wanted to make sure he was ok.

He was ok, all right. In fact, he told my mom, ‘On TV they said the marines were sent in, but I didn’t see any on my walk.’

‘You took a walk during the riots?’

‘Well, of course I did,’ he told her. ‘I wanted to see if they were reporting things correctly.’

I-could say a lot more about my Uncle Edward. He once tied up an intruder with a phone cord before calling the police, an impressive feat at any age, but Edward was in his 80’s at the time.

In addition to being a kickass octagenarian, he even had a photographic memory. But I’ll save those stories for a rainy day. Wait…it is a rainy day. Well, I’ll save those stories for an even rainier day.

Bottom line is, I figured if my 80-year-old ‘uncle’ could traipse around during the Rodney King riots, I could certainly take a wee passegiata while the Pope’s in Naples.

For one thing, security, which is always beefy in this part of town, has been positively on steroids for the past few days. In addition to all the cop cars and vans, the Guardia di Finanza even has several luxurious looking motor coaches parked near the square where the Pope is giving mass.

Not surprising, since that branch of police also drives Alfa Romeos around town. They don’t seem to have the budget concerns that other police branches do, such as the ones Sognatrice, over at Bleeding Espresso, reported on in her amusing article about a bungled shoe order for Italian policewomen.

So I donned my raincoat and took the plunge. The moment I stepped onto Via Roma, I was swept along by a human current. I’ve never seen so many umbrellas. It looked like the mass exodus of multi-colored sea turtles.

I figured there would be street venders selling Papal geegaws: Benedict keychains, and the like. But today’s peddlers were strictly practical. Every ten feet I’d see another one with a baby stroller laden with umbrellas.

I’ll-bet they made a mint today, because Italians absolutely hate to be rained on. Just yesterday, Angelo was telling me that he owned more umbrellas when he lived in Naples than when he lived in Seattle.

On my way back, I wandered through a few side streets that were practically deserted. One nearby restaurant, Ciro a Santa Brigida, even created a special pizza in the pope’s honor. The toppings are buffalo mozzarella (yum!) and corn (huh?) because yellow and white are official Vatican colors.

As for the Pope, who is giving mass just around the corner as I write this, I didn’t catch a glimpse of him. I did see a priest, a nun and a cop waiting in line for a Port-o-potty, though. Doesn’t that sound like the start to a joke you’d hear from a dubiously related uncle? Now, if I can just figure out the punchline.