winter landscape originally uploaded by David Blackwell
Last week’s poll asked about your napping habits and if you took them where that was. I was quite surprised to see the number of people who don’t nap. While not something I do on a regular basis, it is something I enjoy from time to time–especially recently due to the long a dreary winter.
Speaking of long and dreary winters, this week’s poll asks whether you think this year’s winter season has gone on long enough. Year after year I swear I hate winter more but this season has been absolutely brutal. Last week alone it snowed nearly every day and even when temperatures went up into the low 40s, the wind made it feel no different than the day before.
Ever since I moved here I have heard stories of people claiming that the amount of snow we received was nothing like what Minnesota used to get. Well with a top 10 snow depth year I’m still hearing people say, “this winter wasn’t so bad…” Yeah, right.
So after this winter do you still love the season? Are you ready for it to be done? Did it make it that much harder waking up this morning knowing it was snowing for the 4th day in a row? Whatever you have to say about the winter season and how this year affected your thoughts on it go ahead and vote on the sidebar and then comment on as I’d love to hear what you have to say. After you do both of those things feel free to check out our expired polls in the archive or read through the previous posts about polls here.
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March 13th, 2011 at 7:21 am
i love the changing seasons and am very ready for the change from white to green.
bb
March 13th, 2011 at 8:08 am
I voted “Not after this year” since this was the year that made me actively dislike winter. I was apathetic towards it the last few years, but this season was the one that made me actually disdain it. While I still try to make the best of it, I would be perfectly happy at this point to never see snow again (to say nothing of the cold).
March 13th, 2011 at 9:33 am
Do we get to vote for this? I didn’t know we got to vote on this! Who keeps voting “longer winter”?
I still love winter. I just returned to knitting a couple of months ago, and I’m obsessing on wool. Also, I hate heat, unless it comes from buffalo wings, a bath or a woolly blanket. I don’t shovel, either, and I usually have the option of staying home when it snows, so I’m sort of lucky.
But I am ready for spring. It’s time. I need to see the green.
Hey, maybe Easter will actually LOOK like spring, being so late this year!
March 13th, 2011 at 11:01 am
Honestly, I don’t mind it. I’m a bit of a shut in so I don’t mind curling up with a soft blanket, some tea, and a book (plus a dog or cat or 3). Since starting to take the bus the snow bothers me even less. I usually get to work on time regardless of the weather. I think there were 3 times this winter when the bus didn’t get me to work on time and all three times were pretty bad weather and my boss understood (I still made it earlier than those that drove).
I’m with Michele, I HATE heat. I’m grumpier in the summer when it is 85 and 90% humidity. I pretty much leave the A/C on from May to September. There is NOTHING worse on a migraine than hot, humid weather. BLAH!
March 13th, 2011 at 11:44 am
With winter being as long as it is, you’ve got to find a way to enjoy it–or better yet, several ways. I have, so it’s fine with me. I took my 3-year old skiing this week (first time), and she loved it. I hate the transition to summer–wet, soggy, ground, pools of water and mud everywhere, etc. Maybe we can compromise–keep snow on the ski area slopes until early April and then poof, 70 degrees and dry?
True enough, the several enormous dumps of snow were troublesome, causing several long days of clearing snow, plus some ice-dam damage in my house. (Should have had better circulation in the attic, I guess.) The worst part of it all, I lost an acquaintance (didn’t know him well enough to call him a friend) to a heart attack, almost certainly brought on by a lengthy session of shoveling snow.
March 13th, 2011 at 11:55 am
I like winter for the first 3-4 weeks every year, and then I’m done. Last winter was perfect, people were out on patios by this time. This winter is total bullshit. TOTAL BULLSHIT.
I have two friends moving up from Louisiana in 8 days. I had assumed that we would have no snow by then. But it is going to be winter parking restrictions and cold for when they come. I’m sad for them.
March 13th, 2011 at 12:00 pm
Kassie,
I’d feel worse for them if they didn’t show up with some snow to teach them what it’s really like to live in this fuckhole state in the winter. You make it through the summer, which is usually gorgeous, and you think to yourself, “what a great place to live!”
Then you get to November and the first serious snow falls and covers everything in blinding white. It’s gorgeous. You’re happy. Then you get to March and you want to fucking kill yourself because you’re so insane over the 160th time you’ve shoveled, or the second time you’ve slammed into a 10 foot plowed wall of ice to avoid some asshole driving without their lights on who slammed on their breaks and kept sliding almost into you.
Bah, TOTAL BULLSHIT is right Kassie. Fuck this.
March 13th, 2011 at 12:37 pm
I used to prefer cold over heat too, but at some point, my internal thermostat changed or something and now it’s the other way around. I really noticed it last fall when I was walking around Vegas in 100-degree heat, wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, and feeling totally comfortable whereas on previous visits it made me miserable.
March 13th, 2011 at 12:42 pm
I grew up in northern Minnesota on the Iron Range, went to college in Duluth and can honestly say, I used to love winter and the snow and all that went with it. Since moving down here, I can’t stand it anymore. People just don’t seem to deal with it as well down here, and it it starting to rub off on me. Also, since getting a dog, taking him out in the winter just sucks!
March 13th, 2011 at 1:30 pm
My dog had it right. For the first snow or three, he would get excited and race out the door, stick his whole head into a pile of snow, then shake it off and gallop joyously around the yard. Around snowfall number four or so, we would open the door for him and he would look at us as if to say, “You’re kidding. You really want me to go out there?”
I would be happier with Minnesota summers if we had more than one early week without mosquitos. I don’t enjoy the frizzy hair that comes with humidity, either. O.K., one more thing, I don’t understand swimming in swampy lakes. Maybe I should move away.
March 13th, 2011 at 2:45 pm
You think Winter sucks for you? Try walking from your house to your neighbors as the crow flys and then keep doing that for about 350 houses and 6.5 hours. If I hear one more “Winter shut-in” bitch about the snow I’m going to puke. I can already hear the comeback…find a new job. Good luck with that right about now.
March 13th, 2011 at 4:31 pm
Ah, the joys of living in Minnesoooota! Fantastic! Ya gotta admit it keeps the riff-raff out – most of the time… a few exceptions. But, I am ready for 50 degree weather. I love that part of spring where the trees are just budding and the river valley is chartreuse – gorgeous.
Bill… you might try harder to expand your vocabulary. I know, it’s an east coast thing.
March 13th, 2011 at 5:54 pm
I love Winter to a point. I like it for a couple of months when the snow is still white and not looking like barf. This winter has just been absolutely brutal.
However, once my kid starts to get older and maybe starts appreciating snow, I might change my tune.
Bring on baseball season.
At least we don’t have termites. :-/
March 13th, 2011 at 10:23 pm
Mailman guy,
If it makes you feel any better, you’re appreciated. I’ve had several mail carriers in my family and it is a tough job!
March 13th, 2011 at 10:21 pm
Or snakes (poisonous), spiders (poisonous), alligators in our swimming pools, or a 1,000 other things they deal with in the south. Also? No tsunamis or earthquakes (allegedly we could have an earthquake but I’ve lived here most of my life and never felt one). I’ll take winter over poisonous predators any day.
March 14th, 2011 at 7:37 am
I love winter. I’m ready for green.
Mailman guy, wow.
March 14th, 2011 at 7:59 am
I tend to love winter, when winter is happening when winter is supposed to. Now is about the cut over month, though during my childhood it was more like the last week in February, first week in March. Not the 3rd week of March.
I also love spring when there is a spring. I hate it when there isn’t one. I love summer when there is a real summer. And I love fall when it’s a real fall. One or two weeks of each season is not a season. Unfortunately we’ve had a lot of seasons like that the past few years.
And I concur with many, the main reason I like winter is because it kills the nastier bugs out there. Not too many scorpions hanging around MN.
March 14th, 2011 at 2:44 pm
I am Totally DONE WITH WINTER for this year!!!! C’mon warm sunshine!!
March 14th, 2011 at 3:16 pm
Mailmanguy,
Maybe if you used the sidewalks and driveways, you wouldn’t be so grumpy. It is kind of stupid to be walking over the mounds of snow.
March 14th, 2011 at 3:24 pm
Mrs. Marcos thanks for the support.
Lefty, do you live in MN? What time does it get dark on say December 30th at your house? Do you think it would maybe take a little bit longer to walk twice as far everyday? Just asking. Enjoy your walk from your underground heated parking spot to your comfy office chair. Good luck.
March 14th, 2011 at 3:35 pm
Mailman guy,
I am just saying that “as the crow flys (sic)” typically means the opposite of what you attempted to portray. You should have said, “as the mailman walks”. So do you usually cut through your customer’s lawns in the summer?
I don’t have heated parking yet but I am hoping! Thanks for the good luck wishes.
March 14th, 2011 at 8:47 pm
My mailcarrier walks all over my lawn. We and our neighbor actually shovel a path for her between our houses so she can cut through.
This mailman guy is kind of grumpy though. Brian?
March 14th, 2011 at 8:57 pm
That’s what they normally do in places that don’t have curbside mailboxes like we usually do here in suburbia, where the mailbox is mounted on the house instead. The reasoning is that it saves time (and thus money) to have them do that rather than go back down to the sidewalk or street each time. Of course, that would seem not to be the case when there are deep snowdrifts.
March 14th, 2011 at 9:05 pm
Sorry Tim, just went through and cleaned up your username a bit. You lost a few comments to other people stealing your name over the years. All fixed. You can hit #800 all over again ;)
March 15th, 2011 at 8:35 am
FWIW, we have a mailbox slot on our house where the mail drops into our coat closest, so that’s why we shovel a path.
March 15th, 2011 at 8:49 am
My mail gets delivered by a truck.
I think Mailman guy should sign up for a truck gig before he goes postal.
March 15th, 2011 at 5:19 pm
Its a Winter topic Lefty. Not about the US Postal Service. I’m going to email Bill and see if the moniker answer man is available, because for a guy that I’m guessing has never put in a hard days work in your life you seem to have it all figured out.
March 15th, 2011 at 9:41 pm
That pic for the poll is gorgeous.
March 15th, 2011 at 9:48 pm
It has admittedly been a winter full of heavy snowstorms really messing with out daily routines. But this is MN afterall. Try to enjoy it! It’s not even Spring for another week. :) My wife and I went up to Lutsen three weeks ago for a long weekend. We don’t even ski or anything but wanted to check it out. It’s a short drive to Grand Marais and it felt so surreal up there. Everything was ice-blue and the vastness of Lake Superior made you feel like you were on the edge of something. Then the clouds parted and we caught a fantastic sunset hitting all the ice and the lake. It was awesome.
Also, The Crooked Spoon has some seriously good food.
March 16th, 2011 at 10:40 am
Looking out from my ivory tower this morning, I am loving watching this winter melt away.
Minnesota is funny. As much as I think I remember how awful this winter has been, all I have to do is swivel around in my comfy leather office chair to see the sun shining and the snow melting and it becomes really easy to repress the memory of having to pay people to remove the snow from my drive.
Also, everyone just gets in a better mood this time of year. Even the bikini clad supermodels that frequent my office here have bigger smiles on their faces than usual. So cute. I love Minnesota.
March 17th, 2011 at 7:49 am
I love winter, I love the snow…. That being said, if it was white from Thanksgiving to Mid-Janary, I would not complain at all. I’m more a fan of that time between Sept-Nov and late March-mid May where you really don’t need heat OR A/C on to be comfortable in the house.
At any rate, I’m OK with some time with the white stuff, but for now, it needs to go away. I’ve got camping, biking, boating and outdoor crap to do!
March 20th, 2011 at 7:01 am
[...] week’s poll asked if you love winter, especially following this one. While “Yes” had the most votes, the number of people who switched due to this year [...]