Visiting Your People, Peter -- brilliant!
It is to weep --- writing this on a grey wet mid-October day in Ottawa.
Loved the Vivaldi -- well done. In 2007 we spent a week-plus in Venice. Wandering about one morning, all-of-a-sudden, Vivaldi came over the public PA. "How nice--" sez I, "a spontaneous tribute to a native son."
Ummm, not quite: seems the Tourism Office decided that a klaxon blast was an inappropriate tool to advise unaware/witless tourists of higher-than-usual tides. Landlubbers as we are, we made no connection between Vivaldi and high tides, but his aural presence did reinforce all our positive stereotypes of Venice.