Well Italy, hope you enjoyed your curling phenom while it lasted. If you need him, he's in the Alps right now with the sound of music.

Before I condemn Retornaz entirely — or at all — he has some validity justifying his move to a higher altitude. For one, the Italian national team is assembled by the national curling committee, rather than holding a playdown tournament to determine the champion (like in Canada and the U.S). Retornaz's teammates in Torino are not his regular curling buddies, and next year the national team could be completely different — or worse, not including the young stallion at all. So he grabbed the opportunity which best suited him to compete in next year's world championship.

Plus, Retornaz was born in Switzerland. So it goes without saying that his cough drop of choice is Ricola.

Since the man is only 23, he has several years of international competition ahead of him. Canada's Russ Howard proved you can win an Olympic gold medal at 50 years of age, so perhaps our studly hero will bounce between Italy and Switzerland — maybe one year he'll play for Slovenia as the result of a terrible misunderstanding — and bring home trophies emblazoned with two different flags.

Italy's main athletic exasperation is definitely the result of Juventus becoming a minor league soccer team. But thanks to those scheming moneychangers and their tiny pocketknives, I'm sure Switzerland made Italy perturbed that Retornaz is now a Swiss curler.

Much like most of you are perturbed that I'm writing about curling in August.