Rick Steves lives! He is not a cyborg created by PBS.

I ran into Rick Steves today. Literally. This big gringo trailing a camera crew almost elbowed me in the Piccolomini Library of the Duomo. I looked up, and it was Rick Steves. I was carrying one of his guidebooks, so I touched his arm and showed it to him, and he grinned. I said, "There's an archaeology conference in town, down at the psychiatric hospital [sic--perhaps I should have explained better]. You should stop by." He said, I would love to," which I took to mean "I would love to if I weren't working for a living" or "I would love to but I'm sane."

To understand the thrill of the encounter, you have to understand that for us Chardonnay-swilling, freedom-hating, science-loving liberals, Rick Steves is like a rock star. In fact, I had begun to wonder whether he was a cyborg created by PBS just for fund-raising. If he is, the technology sure has improved. He is much more life-like than Data from Star Trek, The Next Generation. I suppose that, technically, he could be an android and not a cyborg, but I'm not sure how to tell the difference.

He's much taller in real life than he looks on TV. I know that the camera adds 5 pounds, but I didn't know it added 5 inches too.