Mea Culpa

I shouldn't have said the following: "It takes a certain person—a moron—to live in a cold-weather climate." I was trying to be provocative, but it came across as insulting. What I should have said is that I don't understand why someone would put up with cold weather, when he or she doesn't have to. I spent 26 years in Michigan. That was enough for several lifetimes. Having lived in both a cold-weather climate (Michigan) and two hot-weather climates (Arizona and Texas), I can say that there is no comparison: The hot-weather climate is vastly superior. Please remember that if you like playing in the snow, you can travel to Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming, Idaho, or Montana during the winter months. Many Texans do just that.

Comments

[J. Reed Anderson]

That's okay. Many of my relatives think I'm a moron for living almost within sight of the Canadian border, so I'm used to it. However, if you're not a "U-per" then Michigan is really a southern state.

[steve walsh]

What is happy without sad, warm without cold, cold without warm? Uneventful and boring, that's what.

I guess that I would become accustomed to it, but can't foresee anytime when I would choose to live in a place without four full seasons (as defined by what I experience in the Northeastern United States).

There is no weather I enjoy less than a very hot (>75 degrees) day unless you add high humidity (>75%). Of course this means there are always two weeks in July in the place I choose to live that I find unbearable!

[Mark Spahn]

A side-note on how we measure weather temperatures. Although the Fahrenheit scale was not invented for this purpose, it makes an excellent way of denoting air temperature: it's an extensible 0-to-100 scale in which the midpoint, 50 degrees, is what most people (at least in the Temperate Zone) would consider neutral, with the endpoints 0 and 100 representing coldness and hotness of equally extreme discomfort. A friend of mine, Gerry Rising, who writes weekly nature column for the Buffalo News, wrote an article about the history of the Fahrenheit scale:
http://www.mail-archive.com/usma@colostate.edu/msg24030.html
(I think I'm the "one defender" of the Fahrenheit scale mention in his last paragraph.)
-- Mark Spahn (West Seneca, NY)

[Steve Burri]

Fire ants everywhere, scorpions in your underwear drawer, rattlesnakes in your garden, copperheads (double entendre), water moccasins coming through your toilet, killer bees that will chase you throughout your half marathon (record time), black widow spiders that are not filled up even after devouring their mates, brown recluse spiders that are never recluse enough, armadillos that try to kamikaze your truck's oil pan...

Have you hugged your snow shovel today?

[Keith Burgess-Jackson]

I haven't encountered any of those animals, Steve. I've lived in Texas for more than 19 years.

[Peg]

If I had to choose between weather over 80 and weather under 20 - under 20 would win every time for me. I honestly start to feel ill, as temperatures and humidity begin to rise. When temps are cold, I feel invigorated and active.

Of course, the weather than no one really seems to like (including me) - the under zero frigid stuff - is only around for short periods during the winter.

So. I live "up here" not because I am a moron but because it fits my weather preferences!

[Steve Burri]

I just missed the killer bees' spread into Victoria County and I actually never encountered a Brown Recluse, but the others...

Residents of the coastal plains always considered anyone north of I-10 to be Yankees anyway.

Keith, there are many who call you a Yankee. So in the words of Paris Hilton, "That's hot!"