It has only snowed here once in three weeks and that snow melted the next day. I have no training in this field but I could be a meteorologist in this town. Every day is cloudy and 38 degrees. It’s uncanny.

There are no sunrises or sunsets to mention. Only that it gets light grey each morning and dark grey every night.

But the other night the town turned white. Which I personally believe is a different color than grey so I almost peed my pants with excitement. Fret not. I wear adult diapers. I don’t need to. I just have no buttocks so I wear them for enhancement purposes.

It also happened to be the one night this month Andy Benton and I set aside to go into downtown Torino and shoot a story on the nightlife surrounding the Olympics. Normally we can’t shoot stories at night because Andy likes to disco and refuses to interrupt his prime dancing hours… roughly 8 PM to 3 AM. If you’ve seen Andy move, the grace, the ease, you know what I’m talking about. It’s perplexing that he never became an ice dancer.

Ponte Vittorio Emanuele I (The bridge over the River Po at Piazza Vittorio).

So we didn’t shoot the “nightlife” story we had set out on. Because snowflakes the size of enriched white bread slices were dropping on the city.

If you’ve ever been in an ugly northern American city (pick one) in the dead of winter and then had it snow like mad, it’s suddenly beautiful. Now imagine a fantastically amazing city like Torino with this blanket of snow. It’s dreamy.

Thus the story turns out to be a scenic winter wonderland type story with stunned locals who admit this is a remarkable snow event for them. (I learned the phrase “snow event” from a meteorologist.)

It was pure divine coincidence that Andy decided to forsake shaking his groove thing (Or is it “thang”? I honestly don’t know. You can decide.) that one night because he captured a wonderfully beautiful night in a mesmerizing town.

The luscious ladies of Torino’s disco scene were sad but the rest of you benefit from their loss.

Okay, I need a snack so I’m running to grab some gelato, but tune in tonight and see Torino hit by a rare “snownado.” (I learned the word “snownado” from a meteorologist.) We’re on at 5:15 PM and again in the Olympic Zone show at 7:30 PM.

Tonight at 11 PM we show you my dorm room and how I cleverly created my own refrigeration unit. Cheese and salami need to be chilled to just the right temperature. Different than milk. It’s very MacGuyver-like.

Ciao,

Mike Redding