This is John Batscher, comment by Jeff Bliss, my Pacific Watcher,

about the upcoming Winter Olympics in the Italy and the Alps,

report by Lorenzo Fiore, that they're concerned about the inadequate snowfall

in the eastern side of the Alps.

The western side apparently has plenty of snow.

And Jeff speaks to the concern of a colleague of his, a bobsledder. They need lots of snow. Not unofficial. The real stuff is also ice hockey. We're looking forward to it. We'll cover the winter limits carefully with Jeff and Lorenzo over these next weeks.

Here's Jeff.

It does. I'm a big hockey fan. I actually grew up playing hockey, so I'm looking forward to that. And there's been some controversy about the hockey arena being finished on time. So we'll see if that happens.

But I have an acquaintance, a pretty good acquaintance, who's a member of the U.S. women's bobsledding team. And I'm looking forward to hearing from her and her husband as they travel over there what the weather conditions are like, because, of course, that's an entirely outdoor sport. And, you know, they count on a great track and great weather conditions to have, you know, a lot of speed and great races.

So we'll see how it goes.

I'm crossing my fingers and touching wood, as Lorenzo says.