I'm not sure if I should b proud 2 live in it, or if I'm biggest idiot in world!

Sort of how I ended up in St Pete too. Loaded up the car in Mich.Was like Nov / Dec 85
emptied the bank account and drove S until I ran out of money / gas. Landed in St Pete. Never looked back after the first week

 

My wife and I hate the heat and while winter here is probably not as cold as where you are I don't think we'd mind it. In the mid-atlantic summer is miserable.

As an aside, we've also determined that in a marriage it's far more important to hate the same things than to like the same things.

 

An excellent observation. After 48 years of marriage, I will totally agree with the above.
Part 2: There are advantages and disadvantages to either really hot or really cold. Assuming a proper amount of antifreeze, I'd rather leave my collector car outside in 20 below for three months then in 90 degree sun for a week. Believe it or not, I also enjoy cutting and splitting firewood. I do not enjoy being cold. After our retirement we spent about five years as snowbirds , heading to our small house in Cape Coral, FL. We then decided that it didn't make a lot of sense to spend about $10,000 per year in taxes on our Massachusetts house that we lived in for seven-ans-a-half months per year. We also still had to heat the place. Now we are full-time Floridians. There are about three days each year where it is absolutely too humid to work outside (the highest temperature that I have seen here is 95; it gets hotter then that in summah in Massachusetts). We hope to build another garage in the next couple of years, then this will be Eden.

 

It was my smart & beautiful wife that actually came up with that. I never worried that we really don't have a lot of things in common that we like (we're pretty intellectually equal, of like minds politically, same race/religion although neither overly religious, have math/science education backgrounds) but it bothered her more so. I was pointing out that there are a lot if things we both hate, or don't want to do in life (e.g. Neither of us have any desire to go to Asia, Africa or South America, we both hate the heat, we tried a cruise once and neither of us liked it, but neither ruled out maybe trying it again). She came to the realization that hating the same things are more important, which was really a brilliant observation.

 

No I like the cold.

Moving to Florida was a mistake. So friggin hot you're soaked with sweat to your knees 40 weeks a year, 6 weeks you're just sweaty, you can open the windows for 3 weeks and run the heat for 3 weeks. The AC or heat is running for 49 weeks.
Plus something is always chewing on you 24/7/365 when you are outside, mosquitoes, biting flies, knats and fire ants never take a vacation.

The only advantage to living here is the absolute abundance of ultra clean, cheap rides!

I'll deliver rust free vehicles to you cheap, I'm 66, need to retire from work and find something to do. Absolutely amazing 80's, 90's & early 2000 vehicles here cheap. I gotta start a locating service for you guys up north, I trip over a couple dozen absolute steals a year on amazing DD cars and with North Central Florida being the redneck capital of the world there are two or three pickup trucks and/or full size SUV's in every driveway.

Mikey

 

Bring them up here and I'll sell them. 68 and retired as well. Buy two, I'll fly down. We drive them up here. You fly back.

 

Don't like the days that have negative numbers for high temps, but those are actually quite rare here in Central MN..

After a newsworthy cold snap last week, this weekend was beautiful.. upper 30's yesterday, and I was out an about with just a sweatshirt.. warm out..

The Human body adapts to temperatures, hot or cold, so it's really a relative thing.. Extremes either way are certainly there, and require appropriate action to safeguard life and limb. But my UPS man does not bother to wear long pants until it gets down into the 30's.. I looked up from desk last weds, from my office that overlooks the shop, and saw something new.. my UPS man was making a delivery, and he had both a hat and a jacket on.. never seen that before.. That is how I knew it was cold out..

While I don't have the data to back this up, I would wager there are more deaths from heat, than from cold in the US every year.

Beyond the physical stuff... I love spring and fall... Fall challenges you to overcome the impending winter season, gives you a natural break in time to evaluate and analyze the season gone by, in both your work and play, and to prepare for the snow and cold to come... and spring is like a whole new season of outdoor activities and adventures await.. and the landscape comes to life again... a sense of renewal and new possibilities... it's a feeling that those of you who live in "summer year round" can't really appreciate.

From a strictly practical standpoint, considering what I do for a living, my life would be easier if I lived in a year round warm climate.. but then again, had my folks moved to a warmer climate when I was young, I would be an electrician right now, having followed my Dad in his contractor business.. I chose to be an auto tech, because I didn't want to spend half the year outside in the cold at construction sites.


JW