Why we live in these miserably cold places...

[cthulu2016]

Disease and parasites. (Human disease/parasites and crop disease/parasites)

That would be my guess.

I don't have a handy statistic on this, but my sense is that the Earth's population is denser in the temperate zones.

Before vaccines, antibiotics and sanitation it was, on average, not a bad net strategy for some folks to start wearing furs and having fires (technologies) and living in places where going outdoors naked a lot of the year will flat-out kill you.

Because it was even worse than that, in net survival effect, in the warmest climes.

That and we probably already ate most of the large delicious animals down south.

But seriously... we weren't made for this!

[yuiyoshida]

1. Please, please, please..let me live here..

[A HERETIC I AM]

5. WOW! I lived there in the first year or two of my life!

My dad was stationed in Saipan shortly after I was born and my very first memories are of that island, back in the early 1960's.

Unfortunately I was too small to get out and about on my own (LOL).

Step off that island to the East and the water gets very, very deep indeed.

[matt819]

2. I've been wondering that for ages

We're having a terrible shortage of degrees right now. It's now around 7 and heading to 20 below tonight. Please tell me why I live in a miserably cold place!

[rdking647]

8. i used to live in a miserably cold place

we woke up one morning,it was -20 and we said the hell with it and moved to texas

[matt819]

25. Funny you should mention Texas

We moved from Texas to New England. We didn't move because of the weather, though. A few months after we moved I was talking to one of my former colleagues - it was on Easter Monday in one of those early Easter years. It was absolutely frigid up here; it was 71 degrees in the Texas Hill Country.

Glad I'm not in Texas, but boy is it cold up here.

[Brickbat]

3. I live here because poisonous snakes and flying cockroaches are bullshit.

[gollygee]

6. Yeah that's me too

I can handle cold. (And yes, brrrrrrrrr we are cold right now.) But I am freaked out over things like poisonous snakes, huge and maybe flying cockroaches (or even for them to be common), things like fire ants, any of that.

[Stargazer09]

66. Damn supersized cockroaches

We had those horrid things in our house in Louisiana. You could hear them skittering along the walls at night, and I even sat on one in the bathroom when I was half asleep one night. All the exterminator could do was poison a few of them, but they kept getting past the traps and the poison. (The house was built in 1934, so it probably had walls full of nests.)

Nasty, nasty things.

Fire ants are bad things, too, but they usually stayed outside.

[ThomThom]

69. when I lived where wood roaches exist

I had a friend who would capture them in a styrofoam coffee cup and drop them in another cup with roach proof in it, shake until the roach was completely covered then release. In a couple months he had no more problems. They carried the dust back to the nest and spread it around.

I live where it doesn't get too cold or too hot. There are a few days a year at the extremes but that is manageable. I find too hot worse than too cold. When it is cold just layer up but if it is too hot you are not allowed to layer down to nothing.

[HappyMe]

7. Hear, hear!

Unrelenting heat and humidity also.

[Brickbat]

11. Agreed. I prefer cold weather.

[former9thward]

26. Maybe in the SE not the SW.

Warm and no humidity in AZ. -- an far fewer insects, etc. than I had to put up with in Chicago.

[HappyMe]

50. No thanks.

I can't imagine putting up with the heat in the summer.

[former9thward]

56. We don't.

They invented a thing called air conditioning back in the 50s. We use it.

[HappyMe]

58. I like being outside though.

Where I live now, I can enjoy the fresh air and the scenery. I don't want to be a prisoner in air conditioning.

[former9thward]

62. People are outside in the summer.

And once the sun sets the temperature immediately drops and it is very pleasant outside. I am a runner and I am outside for considerable lengths of time everyday. When I lived in Chicago I used to laugh at people from AZ who would talk about a "dry heat" being much more comfortable than what we had in the Midwest. But I found out they were right. To each their own.

[PeaceNikki]

9. This.

And 95 degrees plus with humidity? Miserable, also.

[lpbk2713]

10. Don't forget the Black Widows, Gators, Pythons, Sink Holes, Hurricanes ...

ad nauseum.

[cthulu2016]

16. Yes, those count too.

I suppose I could have said "hostile life-forms" which would include the diseases and parasites as well as the insects, molds, agtors, etc..

[laundry_queen]

17. Yes. This.

and poisonous spiders, and scorpions, and hurricanes and malaria and brain eating amoebas...

[LiberalEsto]

20. And in Florida, Floridians

a certain percentage of whom are several cans short of a sixpack.

[RagAss]

43. I resemble that remark.

[RKP5637]

52. Did you call? LOL!

[JI7]

45. it is one reason i am considering moving somewhere colder, although so cal is not so bad

i think being closer to the ocean kind of helps.

but i do get cold easily and just need to work on that. but i think i would rather deal with that than fucking roaches and shit.

and i'm thinking it would be cheaper in those colder areas also.

[cali]

4. I like it in some perverse kind of way

I like the smell of wood smoke. I like the squeak of snow on a really cold day. I like the way the sky looks. I liked skiing a lot before I smashed up my leg- and x-country as well as downhill. I like the challenge of getting through a fierce winter.

[Brickbat]

12. I love cold weather. I'd rather have -20 than 90.

[RebelOne]

22. I second that.

I grew up and lived in South Florida most of my life until I moved here to North Georgia in 1989. Right now the temperature is 34, but I love it. I would rather have these freezing temperatures than the year-round heat and humidity of South Florida.

[Yavin4]

13. A joke by a female comedian from MN about her Swedish heritage

"My ancetors braved the Atlantic ocean. Traveled across the plains of America and settled in MN, a place that's as cold, dark, and desolate as the one they left."

[WillowTree]

14. Because April always comes eventually and we appreciate it more up here.

[Tikki]

18. I love the temperate weather I live in year around, but the best reason is the fact that my utility.

bills are small.

I am not sure how anyone heats their home in -20 degrees weather, but when I was a kid my
mother heated her house with an oil furnace and it was expensive back then.

Our total utility bill for December was $21.00 for gas* and $43.00 for electricity.
I prob could live in a cold place if I didn't have to pay too much for utilities.

The Tikkis
*we only needed to turn on the gas wall furnace for a couple hours for two days in December.

[fizzgig]

37. we have electric baseboard heat

our electric bill is around $60 a month. we don't get down quite so low as 20 below, but we're supposed to get down to single digits tonight and below zero tomorrow night. turning the heat up to 65 is splurging for us but it's usually set around 58. we just wear slippers and robes all winter.

[Tikki]

40. I could do that at $60.00 a month, but I've heard that some pay $100 or more just to keep...

from freezing. That I could never appreciate.
And we have no need for air conditioning in the Summer… We have the Ocean breeze to cool us...


Tikki

[Glassunion]

15. The peace and quiet... If you don't mind the sound of a tree exploding from time to time.

I was relaxing in front of a fire in the crispness of early morning when Crack! A sound like an explosion came from behind me in the woods. I scanned the trees and saw that a maple tree had "exploded". The explosion caused a big crack in the tree about three feet high. When a winter wind stirs the frozen trees, they sometimes appear to burst vertically. When it was 40 degrees below zero at night, I lay awake and listened to the trees explode. That's a true wilderness thermometer!

—Linda Runyon, The Essential Wild Food Survival Guide

[Kaleva]

19. It gives us motivation to invade southern areas

If one looks at history, you'll see that almost all invaders and expanding empires went east, west and and/or south but only a very few went north in any meaningful fashion.

[cthulu2016]

21. Depends when you start counting

A small band of Africans (small, like a few 10s of thousands) left the horn of Africa and spread around the Earth, killing off all competing species of early-human around the world, including up into Europe to wipe out the neanderthals, north east to eventually take over the (empty) Americas, east into india and then north into china... sorry Peking man! But you were delicious.

(Most of that timeline is not to scale or in order)

The one thing we can say for sure is that all of us, everyone reading this, started out around Ethiopia a long time ago, and that when we left Africa it was terrible news for all other large mammals.

(And, of course, we ended up taking Africa also.)

[aikoaiko]

23. Humankind evolved to snowboard, drive volvos, and buy ikea.

I keed, I keed.

[angstlessk]

24. We moved from VA to MI in July to the coldest winter since 1985 (2009?)

Poor animals were eat up with fleas..even though we did the flea stuff....our first winter here...(admittedly EXTREMELY COLD) killed the flea problem totally...my cat grew his hair back on his back...the dogs stopped scratching..and we were all happy in bed with about 5 pounds of clothes on top cause our paltry blankets did not keep us warm...but WE survived..the fleas not so much!!!!!!!

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

27. Here in miserably cold Minnesota we have

no poisonous snakes (except for a few rare timber rattlers along the river bluffs in the SE part of the state), no scorpions, black widow or brown recluse spiders or tarantulas. We do have bears, wolves and mountain lions, but you can see them coming and they hardly ever actually kill people.

We also have a Democratic governor and legislature, one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, the most generous Medicaid/ACA reimbursement, and one of the best-educated and healthiest populations.

So I'll happily put up with our occasional subzero temperatures if it means living in a state with a civilized government and no poisonous spiders.

[boguspotus]

54. Agreed!

[Mariana]

63. Tarantulas, at least the ones in the US, aren't poisonous.

Just scary looking.

[former9thward]

28. Population in the U.S. has been moving south and west for decades.

In a hundred years the NE will have very few people compared to the rest of the country.

[CatholicEdHead]

32. That can only go on for so long

Lack of fresh water will make people move elsewhere.

[former9thward]

34. Plenty of water here in AZ.

We have plenty underground and any project has to show at least 100 years of water supply. That does not stop anything.

[antiquie]

53. Aren't you all in the same place as we are in SoCal?

Unabated use of groundwater threatens Arizona's future (8/2/2009)

[former9thward]

59. I don't know much about water supply in SoCal.

Your link did not work for me because of cookies or something but the AZ Republic is not known for accurate articles. Especially when the word "unabated" is used in the headline.

There was a good article on all of this a couple weeks ago in the Phoenix New Times which is a liberal/left alternative publication.

http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/valleyfever/2013/12/phoenix-is-doomed-climate-change.php

[antiquie]

64. I'm happy for you that you have no worries

It's really good that Arizona has no water problems, look for influx from California and New Mexico as we go even more arid.

[bluestate10]

78. I doubt it. The Northeast is, with the West Coast, the best educated part of the country.

And have politicians that understand the importance of education. Good educated people innovate. The Northeast and West Coast and increasingly, the Middle Atlantic, are the location where economy driving innovation is happening. The Northeast and other areas of innovation will continue to become more racially and ethnically diverse as more people move in from around the world to participate in advanced economies.

[former9thward]

82. You are fighting the census.

Electoral votes won and lost after the last census:

+4: Texas
+2: Florida
+1: Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, Utah, South Carolina,Washington
-1: Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Missouri, New Jersey, Pennsylvania
-2: New York, Ohio

Notice all the states gaining are in the South and West. All the states losing are in the North and East except Louisiana because of Katrina.

We do have universities in the West and the South. I am a few blocks away from the nation's biggest. It is called Arizona State University. Before interstates and mass airline travel people generally stayed a few miles from where they were born. Now people can move away from miserable conditions. And they are. Your time has come and gone.

[JVS]

29. Because fire was invented a very long time before air conditioning.

[tavernier]

30. I don't mind the cold in my town

of Key Largo. If it gets too chilly, I just adjust the A/C. When the ice gets to be too much, I just toss a few cubes out of my mojito.
And yes, all those snakes and spiders and alligators and hurricanes are just horrible and please PLEASE continue spreading that around because the only thing that really bothers me is all the damn tourists who claim to hate it here but keep coming!!!

[Thirties Child]

31. Weather in the SW corner of New Mexico is heaven. Some snow in winter, cool summers.

We lived close to 7000 feet for ten years, went one year with duct work problems, had neither heat nor air. Did fine without air conditioning, used a wood burning stove in the winter. When it was really cold - maybe 12 at night for a few days - I'd stay up until 2 a.m. to put a log on the fire, Mr. Thirties would get up at 6 to keep it going. We had an electric heater to use in the bathroom when we really needed it, wonderful to sleep in a cold bedroom. I miss the weather there, despise the heat and humidity now that we're back in Georgia.

We had to have AWD to negotiate our dirt road - do we drive over the boulder or through the gulley? One winter friends from Upper New York State, used to driving in snow, couldn't make it to the top of our driveway. We were just a few miles from the Gila National Forest and would watch the planes fly over on their way to fight the summer wildfires. Great year-round weather there if you didn't get burned out in the summer.

[RebelOne]

33. I am in North Georgia, just northwest of Atlanta,

and I love the weather here. This is the first time since 1996 that we have extreme cold temperatures. I don't mind it at all. I lived in South Florida most of my life until I moved to North Georgia. I much prefer these cold temperatures over the year-round heat and humidity down there.

[Glitterati]

35. North Georgia here too

And, I love that we still get to experience all 4 seasons, but that the most brutal (winter) is very short. January and February can get cold and rarely snowy, but that's what we get to call winter. Perfection if you ask me.

As a Chicago area transplant more than 30 years ago, I'd never go back to month after month of being snowed in with cabin fever.

[Thirties Child]

38. We're in the NE suburbs now; lived inside the Atlanta city limits for 36 years.

We had seasons in NM, but you couldn't see them because it was all evergreens. What I missed most was soft Georgia rain. That and the colors of spring and fall.

In our 20s we lived in New Orleans without air conditioning. Couldn't begin to do it now. Amazingly, we even had one snow there.

Edited to add dropped word.

[Zorra]

36. DO NOT move to the southwest!!! We have every disease, parasite, poisonous critter, known to

human kind, not to mention the vicious western werejackalopes that prowl the deserts every full moon, seeking lost humans to spring at and plunge their sharpened antlers into, turning those humans they don't feed on into werejackalopes themselves.



And most uniquely dangerous of all are the meerquats, human sized carnivores who live in warm desert climates, whose bite gives RWers teh gay.

Meerquat cell hunting RWers behind the Space Age Motel, Gila Bend, AZ.

[fizzgig]

39. we don't have terrifying bugs

that's enough to keep me in my cooler, drier climate.

[Liberal_in_LA]

41. that would be a benefit of living in a colder climate

[Zorra]

68. We have scorpions, tarantulas, black widows, Arizona Recluse, Gila Monsters,

Arizona coral snakes, and more varieties of rattlesnake than anywhere else in the world. There's soooo many rattlesnakes here I have to make snake chili twice a week just to keep the rattler population down to safe levels.

Herds of vicious javelina roam suburban neighborhoods, surrounding their hapless victims and ripping them to pieces with their sharp, pointy tusks.

Cougars that crave human flesh are common throughout Arizona, and our black bears, coyotes, and foxes may have rabies. Bobcats, ringtails, owls, hawks and eagles prefer to feast on family pets.

And cacti of every conceivable kind grow here, one species of which is called the jumping cactus, which shoots little cactus balls at you when you get too close to them.

(And for any lurking RWers out there who might be considering moving to Arizona, do not move to Arizona! Phoenix has been ranked in the top ten most LGBT friendly cities in the US, we have huge numbers of minorities, (less than 60% of Arizona's population are non-Hispanic White folks), so you have that "immigrant problem" y'all are always so concerned about. In addition we have a large Native American population, and NA voters vote like 95% Democratic. So it's just a matter of a few years before Arizona becomes infested with a large majority of Democratic voters, and goes dark blue. And, whereas Arizona is becoming more hostile to it's rapidly declining number of conservatives (do not move to Arizona!!!) the fascist republic of Texas loves you and welcomes you and wants you there, (you can make lots of money!) and besides that, there are no meerquats in Texas. So, remember the Alamo, and all that nifty Republic of Texas stuff.)

RWers thinking of moving to a warmer climate in the southwest: Arizona is a really bad place for you. 40% dark skinned people, can you imagine?. And teh gays are taking over, coming out of the closet everywhere. Half the state is turning into the Castro. Arizona will become a conservative nightmare after 2016. Move to Texas, a conservative paradise! Trust me, you'll just love Texas! George W. Bush lives there. If that doesn't convince you to move to Texas, nothing will. (Sorry, DU Texas Dems, you'll just have to move to the New Blue AZ)

Well, looks like it's time for me to get naked out on the back deck, and get my daily dose of vitamin D. Life is just soooo gosh darn harsh here.


Stay warm, y'all!

[SiobhanClancy]

42. After 10 years in the Florida Keys...

I'd had enough for the flying cockroaches,etc and came back home to Maine. Yes,the winters are hard...and this is a particularly rough one...but spring will come again

[Beacool]

44. I've been in So. Florida for two weeks.

I went to put away a frying pan one night and out from the cupboard crawls out a roach the size of my thumb. I called out for the only guy in the house at that moment. He came running and "Raid" it to death. Palmetto bugs.......yuck!!!!

[JI7]

46. you moved there to live or visiting ?

florida is probably the last state i would want to live in .

[Beacool]

65. I was visiting.

I used to live here years ago (my mom lived here). This afternoon I'm flying back to NJ. The weather is supposed to be crummy. I'm not looking forward to the flight. I hate turbulence.

[FatBuddy]

47. lack of a plantation mentality

and a solid work ethic are two good reasons to live in the midwest US.

[B Calm]

48. I like the change of seasons. Our summers are

pleasant, compared to the south where it's unbearably hot and humid/dry!

[jmowreader]

49. I can think of a couple of reasons...

1) It's prettier in the North than it is in the South.

2) We aren't made for blast-furnace heat either, but it's easier to survive extreme cold than extreme heat.

[Art_from_Ark]

55. I respectfully disagree about the "prettier" part

[jmowreader]

86. I'll see your Arkansas and raise you...

The Puget Sound...



The Olympic Peninsula...



Spokane...



Portland, Ore...



Coeur d'Alene, ID...



Sandpoint, ID...



Glacier National Park...



Yellowstone National Park...



Vermont...



Gloucester, MA...



The Thousand Islands in upstate New York...



Cape Cod...

[Art_from_Ark]

87. While Arkansas does not have snow-capped peaks,

the photo of Vermont could very well have been taken in the Ozark Mountains.

More Arkansas photos

Rice fields and ducks in "The Delta"


Triple falls on the Buffalo River (America's first national river)


Bluffs along the Buffalo River


Queen Wilhelmina State Park


Arkansas State Capitol (modeled after the US Capitol)


Lake Chicot State Park


Pea Ridge National Military Park


White Rock Mountain

[Romulox]

51. I thrive in the cold. I don't know if it's personal preference, or genetic? But I come alive like

a malamute.

[muriel_volestrangler]

57. World's population by latitude

http://www.geekosystem.com/world-population-latitude-longitude

Most is between 20 and 40 degrees north.

Rankin: “Taking the northern and southern hemispheres together, on average the world’s population lives 24 degrees from the equator.”

[scarletwoman]

67. Compared to my Norwegian ancestors who came from Trondheim, latitude 63.4297° N,

I live at a wimpy 46.0114° N latitude in Minnesota. But that's as far south as I'm willing to go.

[Codeine]

60. All I know is that Southern California is completely horrible

and plagued by earthquakes and serial killers. Nobody in their right mind should ever move down here. Seriously, it's so, so awful here. . .

[dhill926]

71. agreed….

and the ocean breezes are horrible. Blow you right into the ocean where apex predators await.

[LWolf]

72. After 30 years in So Cal,

I was THRILLED to move 1200 miles north, where it's really cold in the winter, crisp spring and fall, and warm but not miserable in the summer.

Earthquakes and killers I survived, but the heat and wind, the traffic and smog...I haven't been back in 9 years, and if it weren't for some people I care about who are still there, I'd NEVER go back.

[PasadenaTrudy]

73. I've been in L.A.

almost 50 yrs, my whole life. Can't imagine being anywhere else, except maybe Hawaii. I've been through many an earthquake! And Richard Ramirez....

[MindPilot]

75. And the fires, high cost housing, traffic...

It is so underdeveloped there aren't even four seasons.

People should be very grateful that there are those of us willing to make the sacrifice required to live here so the cold places don't get over-populated.

[grasswire]

83. I wish there were more of you willing to do so.

My Oregon is over-run with Californians despite our decades long effort to discourage this. Don't get me started.

[MindPilot]

85. Funny you should mention that

I had a co-worker who took the job in San Diego intending to move here; he wanted to escape the "libtards" in Oregon. After he discovered that a) San Diego is not the red enclave he thought it was going to be, and b) he couldn't sell his house in Portland, he moved back.

[bonzaga]

61. Actually, it's because of natural resources

If there's a source of fresh water and agriculture, humans will move anywhere they can mine minerals or cut down trees. And when Antarctica melts, we will be moving there as well.

[bluestate10]

80. I went shopping today and found delicious tomatoes that were from Canada.

Technology is opening up all parts of the world. Educated populations will prevail, warmer regions tend to have less educated populations, with the exception of California.

[Vashta Nerada]

70. Well, 13,000-14,000 years ago...

large game like Bison antiquus roamed the Plains in these cold areas. That's why the Paleoindians stayed in the High Plains. The food was here. They learned to adapt, however, by wearing furs and lighting fires to keep warm.

[MindPilot]

74. Anything under body temperature is by definition, cold.

Outside of a spacesuit it is simply impossible to put on enough clothes to stay warm because no matter what you still have to to inhale that cold air.

That's why I like to go to Vegas in August--105 at night, that is my idea of paradise!

[Submariner]

76. Temp plunged to 59 last night in Maui County

so I feel your pain.

[kentuck]

77. There is more fate to our lives than we care to admit...

I think?

The biggest decisions are made out of opportunity or fate. Maybe you moved in junior high and had to attend a different school than you had planned? That is the type of decision in life that is made more by fate than choice. But most decisions in life are made from our own personal discretion.

[sarisataka]

79. I like the cold

more than the heat...

Although I won't turn down a trip to Hawaii

[reformist2]

81. Russian, Swedish, and Nowegian ancestors who said, ya, this Minnesota, is just like home!

[grasswire]

84. uff da! nt