Dog Palace?

On our first full day in Venice, Larry woke up with a sore throat and decided to bypass the morning.  He sent Debbie off with instructions to not come back without sore throat medicine.

The rest of the group proceeded to the Palazzo Ducale.  History Moment: What is a Doge?  (No, it is not a dog). The title “doge” was the title of the senior-most elected official of Venice.  Venice was a maritime empire.  It seems to have been a big deal to be the doge.  A Doge was elected for life and got to wear a nice red cape in all the pictures.  He was the head but had no real power.  He had to live in the Palazzo Ducale and couldn’t leave Venice.  A Grand Chancellor was also elected from the middle class to oversee the secrets of the Council.  To make sure the Grand Chancellor didn’t sell the secrets, he was paid $700,000 a year as a salary.  (No one could afford to buy a secret so basically was paid to be honest).

The group took the The Secret Itinerary tour through the Palace which covers the rooms and chambers where the delicate work of some of the most important bodies in the Venetian administration was carried out.  (Remember that Grand Chancellor?).  Turns out the Grand Chancellor and his staff had dumpy rooms.  The nobles had fancy rooms to work in while the middle class did not.  The tour included the prison (Debbie was not impressed), the bridge of sighs (You sigh as you go to prison, and Casanova’s jail cell).  Basically, you knew about those rooms if you were going to jail or worked in the “No heat or no cooling” part of the building.

The next concern was lunch.  We were all very stressed as we got into the maze of shops behind St. Mark’s square.  Joyce had one friend that got lost and couldn’t get out for 4 hours.  With the groups tendency to get lost, you realize that this could be a problem.  We were on the hunt for “Aldo’s Take Out Pasta”  We found the street and were searching.  Joyce asked in a shop for Aldo’s.  The lady yelled down the street “Hey Aldo someone is looking for you”.

A man standing in his doorway yelled back “Who is looking for me?”

Joyce yelled back “I am”.  Thus we were committed to Take Out Pasta.  You pick the sauce and noodles.  (Actually, Aldo picks out the noodles for you.  You can ask for a certain noodle but Aldo will tell you what type of noodle that you should actually have.  Only Jerry was brave enough to override Aldo on noodle selection.  Jerry swears that his choice was better but we have our doubts).  We got noodles to go for our “Man Down” to deliver with  pharmacy goods.

Debbie was in a quandary as to how to communicate sore throat to the pharmacist.  She envisioned pantomiming a sore throat.  At the pharmacy, she discovered that everyone must queue for consultation with the pharmacist.  (No, you can’t just find it and pick it up).  She stood in line behind a lady with her dog until her turn.  Debbie whipped out her handy phone and showed him “medicina mal di gola? (Sore throat medicine? Are you impressed are what?  Larry was not as impressed with Debbie’s ingenuity as she thought he should have been).   With a lot of head nodding, the decision  came down to spray or suck?  Debbie took the easy road and decided both but had to convince the pharmacist that is was okay to have both.  She finally just said “My husband” and shrugged.  He said “Oh, okay” and sold both to her.  At first, Larry was not really impressed  but now is talking about moving to Venice for the special throat spray.  (He really liked the flip up spray nozzle and might show it to you if you ask.)

Larry was able to venture out in the afternoon and the group took a tour of the Grand Canal.  (Debbie said it was all possible because of the wonderful medicine from the pharmacy.  Larry rolled his eyes.)