Christmas in Italy! The Christmas markets. The traditional foods. The Legend of LaBefana. The Italian Mangers. It is all described in this wonderful 80 page book from World Book.

As with all things Italian, Christmas in Italy starts at the beginning meaning 2,000 years ago and takes you through present-day celebrations held throughout the country. The book is very readable and is full of pictures.

Although the book is written for young people and adults with well developed reading skills, the stories and descriptions could easily be read aloud to children.

It took more than a thousand years for a woman to break into the all male ranks of Venetian gondoliers. The German born woman who will take up the paddle is named Alexandra Hai.

It took a court ruling to allow Hai to become a gondolier. At the moment she can only serve residents of the Locanda Art Deco Hotel.

Although Hai has garnered some support from locals who great her with shouts of "Brava gondoliera!"; the 425 male gondoliers of Venice have not been quite so enthusiastic. Entering into the controversy is the fact that Hai has failed the exam to be a gondolier several times.  The fact that she is a foreigner has not helped her cause.

Rain has finally arrived in northern Italy providing a little relief in an early season drought. The drought has caused the average water level of the PO River (Italy's longest river) to drop 25 feet. The PO flows across northern Italy and is crucial to area farms. The river has been affected by drought several times over the past few years but never this early in the season.

The Italian government on Friday announced emergency action despite rain across the affected central and northern regions. Experts warned that despite Thursday's torrential rain which is forecast to continue for the next sevearl days, the Po was still much too low for this time of the year.

The central and northern areas of Italy have had 20-50% less rain this year than last year. The government action was needed to avert damage to agriculture and to prevent power outages.