I know it is raining, but please close your umbrella, walk 5-ft. to any convenience store, and buy a $5 regular sized-umbrella. Yours was designed for the beach, not for the sidewalks of Boston. It would be put to much better use by lining the interior with mirrors to replace the aging Hubble telescope. You might also consider donating it to SETI so they might finally contact alien life. You might even bring down our health insurance costs, as hundreds of passersby - to whom you appear oblivious - nurse their eyeballs from the gauges of your umbrella's pointy tips.

I'm not sure why only men seem to use the jumbo umbrellas. Maybe they're compensating. Maybe they were asked at McDonald's if they would like to super-size their umbrella. Maybe they got it as a gift at the annual corporate yuppie convention. But I have never seen a lady carrying an umbrella the Roman Legions would have envied under a volley of arrows.

It is possible that women just like smaller things. They seem to like tiny boxes, often with little flowers painted on them. They like small dogs. They like small people. They like any item small enough to fit in their already small boxes. Maybe they like their umbrellas the same way.

In any event, large-umbrella men might learn something from the fairer gender. Not only to wash their hands when exiting the bathroom, but to also use a smaller umbrella. Nobody will think less of you.