re: Is the Cold Really Worse Than the Heat?

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Those of you who do live where it truly gets cold, what do you say? Is a cold and snowy climate truly worse than the hot climate?

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I have been in Iowa almost four years after living most of my life in Mississippi. Some of the locals up here think I am nuts when I tell them I prefer Iowa winters to Mississippi summers. I absolutely prefer the cold winters to the miserable hot summers. I will say however, that our first winter here, we had a polar vortex and I had to change one of my daughter’s tires when it was -15 outside……I did question our decision at that time, but have gotten much more acclimated. Miserable, humid summers can suck it…..

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I prefer the cold, but I'd never live somewheres that you gotta shovel snow. No thank you

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I shoveled snow once…..and my wife, God love her, (no pics) saw me struggling and ordered a snow blower while I was outside and I gave zero F-s about the cost……

Our bodies are adapted for warm(er) environments.

- Cold will definitely kill you over a much wider range of temperatures.
- you need a much higher caloric intake in the cold
- food is scarcer in the coldest environments
- Cold will kill you faster than heat at the extremes of our naturally experienced temps
- almost all human population bottlenecks were experienced during global cooling
- you can always put on more clothes/furs. can only get so naked.
- biodiversity is much greater and evolves much faster in warmer climates

In short, heat pisses you off. Cold kills.

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My dad and his side of the family is from Ohio

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Sounds like my mom's parents (my grandma and paw-paw). They both grew up around the juncture of Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky. Paw-paw worked as an airplane mechanic at Wright-Patterson airbase in central Ohio. Shortly before WW2 started, he was given a promotion and transfer to Keesler in Biloxi, and after the war, they offered him the opportunity to transfer back up north.

As they told it, their answer was "Hell, no!"

And this was really before the days of air conditioning.

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95% of lifelong southerners who've never had to actually live, let alone work *in* the cold and deal with the extra steps of dealing with it would be ready to head south by new years day. It fricking sucks balls. You think you'd like it, but odd are you would grow weary of that shite with the quickness.

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BiNGO. They think of the fun, fluffy, sunny version, which if you live in a city is incredibly rare...you get the gray, icy, cloudy, wet, shite version.

I've posted this before but it's exactly the journey you describe.

The Diary of a Snow Shoveler

How it starts

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December 8 - 6:00 PM

It started to snow.

The first snow of the season and the wife and I took our cocktails and sat for hours by the window watching the huge soft flakes drift down from heaven.

It looked like a Grandma Moses Print.

So romantic we felt like newlyweds again.

I love snow!

December 9

We woke to a beautiful blanket of crystal white snow covering every inch of the landscape.

What a fantastic sight!

Can there be a lovelier place in the whole world?

Moving here was the best idea I've ever had!

Shoveled for the first time in years and felt like a boy again.

I did both our driveway and the sidewalks.

This afternoon the snowplow came along and covered up the sidewalks and closed in the driveway, so I got to shovel again.

What a perfect life!

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A month in

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December 27

Temperature dropped to -30 and the pipes froze; plumber came after 14 hours of waiting for him, he only charged me $1,400 to replace all my pipes.

December 28

Warmed up to above -20.

Still snowed in.

My wife is driving me crazy!!!

December 29

10 more inches.

John says I have to shovel the roof or it could cave in.

That's the silliest thing I ever heard. How dumb does he think I am?

December 30

Roof caved in.

I beat up the snow plow driver, and now he is suing me for a million dollars.

The wife went home to her mother.

Nine more inches predicted.

December 31

I set fire to what's left of the house.

No more shoveling.

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Entertaining read for anyone who thinks they'd love "the cold", from someone who got sent out to shovel half the driveway in the dark after the plow goes through from the age of about 6 years old on.

Just moved to Utah from Florida.

Only in for one winter and it’s pretty rough for a Florida guy.

The snow is so dry you can’t make snowmen.

Any amount of cold beats living in a swamp where the humidity sticks to your skin and suffocates you.

Alaskan winters aren’t that bad.. there’s something peaceful about the sound and feel of a wood burning stove.

I grew up in Minnesota, had temperatures of -40, -65 with the wind chill. You definitely adjust, but the difference with that type of cold vs heat in the Deep South, if you’re not fully prepared, you’ll die quickly. I prefer a cooler climate, but speaking on terms of survival, the heat is easier to overcome in a subtropical environment.