Daily life in Italy tends toward the theatrical, especially in the caf, as Stefano Giannini notes here 'The Writer's Provincial Muse: Piero Chiara in the Coffeehouse'. The warmth and bustle of an Italian caf at the start of a workday the hiss of espresso machines, the clatter of cups and saucers, the murmur of conversation, the shouts of greetings, and the placing of orderscheered us up instantly. The apartment was at the other end of town, a fair number of steep, staircased streets away from piazza Roma, but this caf remained 'ours'. A Google search tells me that in piazza Roma in Frascati, to the right of the entrance to the Palazzo Senni, there is still a Caff Roma. On weekend afternoons people from other towns in the Castelli Romani come to Frascati to join the locals in a stately parade under the avenue of carefully pollarded trees along the passeggiata.