I went looking for a summer job so I thought outside the box and went to Venice, Italy looking to see if they could use a blogger. The truth is, at the moment there is no need for an American Blogger in Venice. However what I noticed was how similar Venice is to Downtown Southampton and East Hampton. There was a lady's shoe store with shoes starting at $1300.00. Another shop featured men's silk ties for $350.00. Then there were the Channel and Prada shops that somehow seem to be everywhere monied people are rumored to be, but in Venice the only people in the stores were young American girls, giggling. There was no shortage of summer fashion sun dresses starting at $500.00 and up and the size 2 dresses looked good in the windows on the mannequins, reminding me of Newtown Lane, Jobs lane and both East Hampton and Southampton's Main Street.Then there were the odd art shops with paintings, sculptures, and antiques. They were fun to look at but maybe if I ever win a $600 Million Power Ball I will go back and price them. The biggest reminder of home was the pure feel of the tourists walking the town. Some dressed to be seen while others were dressed to be unseen, none the less they all looked happy on the sunny days. Lastly I want to share this one story. When in Venice to get to the airport it is a 45 minute to one hour trip by water taxi, or a special public water bus. That's it. So when I woke and it was pouring with 25MPH winds I was thinking of what sort of an adventure I was in for. So there I was with my wife Cindi on a floating Dock, covered, thank God, bouncing about waiting for the Public water bus. It pulls up, bouncing, shifting, and so forth. We throw the luggage in first and climb in behind. The pouring rain and the roar of the engines racing (after-all we are in Italy and two young guys are at the throttles) are distracting. I realize how good these guys are/were maneuvering this craft which was about 50 ft long. It has only one deck and the 60 seats are down in the hull. We made the plane, but we did bounce quite a bit.
