I’m tired of snow. I know this is true because it’s hardly snowed this winter at all until now. I took the above picture about half-way through our current storm. It was about the second time I’d gone out to shovel that I thought to myself, “I really need to live somewhere without snow. Somewhere warm.”
Typically this thought only comes to me after the fact, but this time the shoveling has me irritated and sore.
Austin, TX looks like a nice place. So does Raleigh, NC (though I’m pretty sure they get snow, so maybe not.)
A few years back we got five feet of snow in as many days. The city ground to a halt under all that ice, and several roofs collapsed – including the roof of the bookstore I’m currently blogging from.
With only two feet, the city is basically up and running. Or crawling. Either way, the thrill is gone. Sure, it’s very beautiful. It’s exciting for the kids. But I realized as I shoveled away at where the plow had buried us once again that I’ve never actually lived anywhere warm. I live in Arizona, and truth be told I do love it here, but a part of me just wants plant my ass in the sand in March. Or in a swimming pool.
Maybe this is simply a moment of passing wanderlust. I moved around a lot as a kid, so that piece of me that’s drawn to wander is tempered mightily by the other pieces that want to stay firmly planted in a place. To call without question a place home.
Having family nearby, eager and willing to help with the kids, and a new house…well, these sides of myself find many reasons to be at perpetual odds. And besides, maybe I’d simply melt under an actual sun. I’m built for the cold physically if not psychologically.
We got a good dump last night, which was necessary and welcome (the farmers are really, really worried about the snow dearth this winter). Today the sun is out. Sun and the sun’s reflection on snow make for a pretty miserable experience for my eyes.
At the moment, it’s looking like next winter here will be our last. We came really, really close to accepting something a few hours from where you are. But it looks like we’re staying put. I am looking forward to a place that we will be able to call home.Report
Sun on snow is hard for my eyes, too. Here at least it melts quickly. In many ways, this climate is so, so much better than a place like Montana (where I lived for quite some time.) But it gets old. We spent last week in Scottsdale in the palm trees, in a pool. It was great. But Scottsdale in July? I shudder at the thought.
Which is to say, I guess I need two houses in two places!Report
My father had a plan for retirement where he would buy a condo in Florida and a cabin in Colorado. He’d live in Colorado in the summer and rent out the Florida condo, then live in Florida in the winter and rent out the Colorado cabin. It’d pay for itself.Report
It just might. But renters are a pain.Report
So jealous. PA barely got any snow this winter. Maybe 5 inches total?
Still, looks like a pain, especially so much at once.Report
It’s not even that big of a deal, honestly. It’s just this thought that keeps swirling about my brain that I’ve never lived anywhere warm, damnit!Report
Six weeks in Sicily bleached my eyebrows white, they stayed like that for years!Report
Is this where we’re allowed to say “pix or it didn’t happen”?Report
yeah. but you ain’t getting my pics. 😉 Besides, I was six at the time.Report
Six weeks in the Mediterranean is something I imagine you’d appreciate now a lot more than when you were six…god knows a lot of the vacations I took as a kid were boring when I was a kid, but would kill for now.Report
Six weeks of chocolate gelato! And being on the more than 100 degree beach. Oh well, at least at age 6 you swim!
(my dad was working, so I spent a lot of it in “school”. got to see elephant man though)Report
Ecch, if you want to change the weather in Arizona, just drive up to Flagstaff. Spend some time in Sedona. I’d drive up to Snowbowl and find snow up there in the middle of August.
Got a ton of pictures from my time there.Report
I live in Flagstaff.Report
We drive through Flagstaff on our way to Albuquerque. I don’t know that I’d live anywhere else in AZ, but Flagstaff looks awesome.
I say this as someone who has never lived anywhere with snow, and thus has only made up stuff in his head about what it is like to live where there is snow.
If you like it mostly sunny and mostly warm and mostly no other real seasons, you should try San Diego or Los Angeles.Report
I’ve always liked San Diego.
To be honest, other than the snow and the wind, Flag is bloody awesome. Really a fun town.Report
You know, hence my bitching about the snow…Report
Might I humbly suggest sunny California. Palm Springs in SoCal is good if you like hot weather; the South Bay in NorCal is good if you want something a bit cooler, but still resolutely snow free.Report
Yes. But they you would have to pay what it costs to live in California!Report
I’d say Honolulu would be a better destination in general…the atmosphere’s so much more relaxed than SoCal and the people are much nicer.Report
California and Hawaii are both too expensive.Report
I have a friend who lived in Hawaii and when I asked him why he left he told me that he go tired of driving in circles.Report
I can sympathize with that. Living on Oahu sometimes felt like I was on a NASCAR circuit.Report
so totally jealous of someone who got to live in hawaii…Report
It was closer to an extended vacation…I think it totalled about 4-5 months, and during that time I didn’t really do anything except read, take long walks, swim, parasail, eat good food…Report
Come down to Austin. Not only do we very rarely get snow, but you could build on your current rise as a video game journalist! Bioware Austin is right in town, as are a bunch of other developers! In depth interviews, hard hitting investigative reporting, etc. etc…
One might also argue this is just karma paying back Arizona with interest for all the silly laws they’re enacting…Report
Hey now, as far as I’m concerned having Brewer and Arpaio is bad Karma enough!Report
When I was in Phoenix, my client and I would roar up to Flag with his girlfriend, saying we were headed to Coconino County to escape Sheriff Joe.Report
Indeed. We are a pond of blue in a sea of red.Report
Unfortunately, Austin summers are becoming more and more Arizona-like. And by Arizona, I don’t mean Flagstaff.Report
and pittsburgh is becoming more like seattle…Report
The recent summers have been terrible…an internship in Geneva sounds like paradise…Report
Spent about six months in Geneva. Expensive town. Large expatriate community. Surprisingly difficult to fit in and make friends. It helped that I spoke French but not much. Every chance I got, I went over to Montreux and Vevey, where I did have friends.Report
I have relatives in Switzerland, so I should be okay so far as fitting in and making friends…the French may be an issue.Report
I’d start right in on French. The 501 Verbs in French book is indispensable. Work a verb a night.Report
Routledge Frequency French, also a gotta-have.Report
Ottawa’s lovely right now. The toddler and I were in shorts at the park, yesterday.
Sorry, rarely in a conversation does Ottawa have far warmer weather than… well… most places.Report
Yeah, no kidding.Report
Minnesota is roasting right now. If I don’t get some cold weather back sometime soon I’m gonna be mightily cross.Report
worry about the calm before the storm. I don’t think you guys are immune to tornadoes. (I’m in Appalachia! we basically are.)Report
Minnesota over all isn’t certainly. The urban heat shield tends to deflect them from the Twin cities themselves. I’m too close in to the downtown core to fret much over tornadoes. I do not want another roaring hot summer. I’ll take the summer of 2011 thank you very much. So wonderful.Report
Not for love or money (well, maybe money) would I ever work in Twin Cities again. Couldn’t get a hotel with a decent kitchen to save my life so I was staying in Woodbury, working over by 280 and Energy Park/Kasota. Driving I-94 coming through St Paul was an act of unmitigated sodomy every day, at every hour of day. What’s more, though I’ve done a good deal of my work remotely, the client absolutely insisted I be there from 8 to 5.
Did an engagement in Eagan before that one. A two mile commute. Eagan’s got the personality of an empty cardboard box though.
Como Park, wonderful. Theater district, a joy. Living there? For the birds, quite literally. Driving in Minn/St Paul is beyond awful, and I thought Chicago and Houston and LA were bad.Report
Not my experience though since I escaped directly from the howling wilderness of Nova Scotia to the Urban busom of Minneapolis perhaps I lack the experience to appreciate a nicer city. I live downtown and walk almost everywhere (only just got a car year 7 of my eight years of living here) so I can’t speak to the traffic (though to a rural Canadian all American drivers are insane). But I love Minneapolis. St Paul on the other hand is the eigth layer of hell. They don’t worship Satan in St Paul, he worships them.Report
hehe. you should try driving in Boston. Or Rome. or, heavens forfend, Sicily!Report
There must be some country that drives more staidly than Canadians! The English? The Germans?Report
Swedes?Report
Neither. Motor sports are quite popular in European countries as a whole…ever notice that the centre of the speedometer is set higher on Eurocars than American ones? That’s not a coincidence..
Swedes love their fast cars, too.Report
oy. yes. I suddenly find myself recalling road rallies in England…Report
Or, worse still, Malta.Report
Wow, another bluenoser! Where in NS were you?Report
St. Paul’s pretty drab, but it’s a nice speed (unless you get on the Interstate). Reminds me of my beloved Madison, without any of the nice stuff. Minneapolis is certainly nicer, but I’m not quite sure what to love about it either. Basically, the Twin Cities have most (not all) of the problems of Real Cities and some (but not that many) of what I consider to be their features. Madison has almost none of those problems, and some pretty decent approximations of the features (and I say this as a guy who does care about things like an ass-kicking professional symphony orchestra, which Minneapolis definitely does have). Only Chicago and New York are Chicago and New York.
I guess what I’m saying is, if you can just choose a city (and who can these days?, but if you could), and you wanted what Real Cities have to offer, for my money you would go with New York or Chicago way before you’d go with the Cities. And if you want some nice stuff in a really livable environment without the big problems of major urban environments, for my money, among the places I’ve been, you’d go with Madison, though I know there are a lot of places like that. I’m not sure know what you would be seeking for the Twin Cities to be the place that fits the bill just right.Report
We got 7 inches total for the winter and 4 of that was a weird March snowstorm a few days after the tornadoes. I was wearing shorts again 3 days later.
…and my grass already needs to be mowed. That just ain’t right.Report
That’s another thing. Nobody has grass here.Report
I have already mowed my front lawn three times. I would have mowed the back yard, but it is still to wet. This winter we got a normal amount of rain with spring temps. It did save a bunch of labor on firewood, but my winter garden went to bloom about three weeks earlier than normal.Report
129 inches of snow here in Anchorage. Second highest snowfall on record. Great winter for skiing but a bit tired of shovelling. We are going to moving in a few years and are struggling with finding a place in the west that still has good winters (ie with snow) and non oppressive summers. I’ve always like Flagstaff myself.Report
Well you live in Alaska you’re sort of asking for it…Report
Sitting at the cafe this morning, it is now a white-out outside. Driving home will be super fun.Report
Evidently we’re getting huge t-storms, hail and flood waters tonight.Report
Fun!Report
Wait, Arizona gets snow? Lots of it!?!? I thought people moved there to get away from snow?Report
Lots of it.Report
Fuck that noise!Report
But remember to wear protection.Report
It was so warm, I went to the beach the past two days up here in BOSTON.Report
Yesterday I started my day with two hours of snow followed by one hour of rain. It was sunny and beautiful for about three hours before it began hailing like crazy for about 45 minutes. Out came the sun again! A little more snow and then it rained until I went to bed.
Love this Oregon weather!Report
Sounds like my town.Report