Yeah. That pretty much sums up my ideal spring weather. Days that you can just put on a shirt and shorts and not worry about sweating immediately. Maybe a light jacket in the eve. Windows open, hearing the birds sing. Able to dig in the dirt a little and enjoy all the fresh green sprouts.
Someone up thread was speaking positively about a day in the 90s last week. IMO, that would be borderline HOT for July-August, and certainly NOT what I would call a beautiful SPRING day. And yesterday, I wore a knit watch cap and gloves while biking.
Hereabouts you just have to take your beautiful spring weather when it comes. In recent years, it has beel possible pretty much any month from February thru November! You just might be shoveling snow - or hitting the beach - the next day.
ISTR a year recently that we had REALLY hot weather early - in May-June. Then in July-Aug when we’d like to hit the pool/beach, we had a bunch of beautiful days in the 70s. Just make few unalterable plans dependant on specific weather, amass a variety of gear for all weather, and take it as it comes!
Today was cold and rainy, but last Sunday was a nice day for hiking (partly sunny, low 60s)
We had a few hot (~80F) days but we had ~5 nice days (65-72) in a row fairly recently.
My ideal bicycling temp is 68-72, hiking I like it a bit cooler. Wind doesn’t bother me for hiking (unless it is VERY strong), for biking “for every uphill there is a downhill, for every headwind there is a headwind”
I can’t complain about current seasonal/weather conditions at all. This past mild winter is fine with me, too. I’ll be camping in Western PA this weekend and fully expect temps to range between 40 and 75, tricky to plan for.
That’s exactly the weather here this week, though up to the mid 60s in the coming days. Wet but not really raining. Cloudy, chilly breezes.
Yeah, I’ll take 50s and 60s weather any day over humid 80s and up. I like it crisp! My 11-year-old daughter was actively complaining to me when it got mid-80s here just a week or so ago.
50s-60s is fine. But IMO not so much when you add in a heavy grey sky without a trace of sunshine, and a brisk wind. Sunny and calm is pretty nice all the way down to 20F or so. Someone claiming the joy of Chicago 50s-60s with a lake breeze, and the simplicity of the correct clothing apparently hasn’t recently sat in the shady stands of Soldier or Wrigley Field on a suitably grey and blustery day! (Especially when you have to watch the likes of the Bears and the Cubs on the field!)
actually, when I lived in Cleveland, I thought overall the weather in all seasons was very moderate, no extremes except the years of Buffalo-lite snow storms
I’ve mentioned this before, but I’ve gradually come to realize that my view of Chicago as one of the worst urban weather hellholes in the U.S. are a wee bit skewed by having only visited a.) three times, b.) when I was a kid and c.) in the two of the worst recorded winters in Chicago history (one year featuring shoveled snow pathways on the sidewalks taller than my head so I felt like I was walking down open air snow trenches) and one utterly miserably hot, humid, sweltering week of summer (and this was me coming from Michigan, with plenty of sweltering summer weeks and plenty of snow). Those Chicago winter winds in particular felt like scalpel blades.
Apparently my childhood recollections are inaccurate and it isn’t usually that bad .
It used to be considerably more wintery. When I was younger, we had snow from November into April and it would be below freezing throughout winter. These days, probably due to global climate change and each year being Hottest On Record it seems, I took my actual winter coat out maybe twice last winter and didn’t have to shovel the driveway once. We had one snowfall of around an inch and that week it was going to be near 50F so I just drove over it for three days until it melted.
Actually, I haven’t ever sat in either of those places, ever.
I did live in Chicago proper for 20 years, most of those just a block and a half from the big lake. I used to cross country ski along the lake front down to 10 degrees regardless of the wind. I used to wait for the bus to go to work, or up on the El platform, in all weather, including sub-zero. I assure you I am intimately familiar with Chicago weather in all its permutations.
Again - I much prefer 50’s, grey sky, and windy (or even 40’s, grey sky, and windy) over 80+ anything, any day.
And yes, you just have to dress for the weather conditions. My preference is to keep moving, I don’t like to sit still and be passively entertained, but if you insist on sitting for hours at a time in that weather dress for the weather and bring a stadium blanket.
We’ve had the most incredible spring here in on the southern English/Welsh border - far sunnier, warmer and generally settled than I would normally anticipate this time of year. Hardly any rain or much cloud since mid-March, days of sunshine, temps around 20C/70F ish for the last month at least. Honestly I’m just hoping this doesn’t mean summer came early and June/July/August will be wet an miserable. I have plans to build an outdoor kitchen so I bloody hope not!
Nope. Here in the UK it’s been a beautiful spring. Lots of warm sunny days at the park and in the garden, and it’s hardly rained for weeks. It has been a bit windy, but that hasn’t stopped us getting out and enjoying the weather. Everything is green, and my garden is finally looking good now I’ve had time to work on it again.
We’ve also been off-grid since early March thanks to all the sun, even with two electric cars. Haven’t needed to use the heating much since then either, so it’s saving us lots of money (and the environment some carbon).
As a lifelong Chicago(area)an, the only 2 really issues I see with Chicago weather are:
We don’t tend to get long stretches of seasonally appropriate weather. Is there any place where the seasons pretty much follow each other predictably and in order? In Chicago, it can snow in October, or be in the 70s in December. On St Patrick’s Day, it might be snowing or you could be on the golf course in shirt sleeves. May and June could be dryer and hotter than July and August. As Broomstick notes, you just need the correct gear. But for me, it kinda sucks when the end of May comes around and I’m wanting to hit the golf course, play music outside, kick back in my hammock - but I’m still wearing a knit cap and gloves.
The springs seem to be long and dreary. After January and Feb, I’m ready for signs of spring. And, to be sure, they are there if you look closely. The cardinal singing. Snowdrops popping. But when you get into mid-late May and are still seeing day after day of chilly, windy grey skies and temps in the 50s. Sure, I can dress for it. But it isn’t my fave. And it isn’t a matter of trading grey blustery 50s for the 80s. How about trading them for a nice calm sunny upper 60s/low 70s? Those are the days that seem the rarest. I remember running cross country in high school, thinking the baseball teams - practicing and playing in the spring weather - had it the toughest of all sports. To this day, I do not envy the parents I see watching their daughters play HS softball at the end of our block - all bundled up in winter coats and blankets.
Today’s forecast - cloudy all day with a high of 53 with a chance of rain.
Paris’s weather isn’t looking all that great in the 10-day, either. Cloudy or partly sunny all week, with four of those days rainy. However, it is about ten degrees warmer. (Currently it tells me 64 and raining. On the 10-day, today is the last day of rain currently forecast, but you know Chicago weather.) Plus my garden welcomes the rain. My parents were bitching about there not being any rain after my mom planted her 50 tomatoes and whatever else she plants and was more than happy to see a few days of rain. Somehow, they even missed that flash storm about a week ago (was like 5 minutes of rain here near Midway, but just a couple miles southwest they got none.)
I tend to think of Chicago springs actually as short, though I don’t know if my memory is accurate. It feels like we have winter, about a month of spring, and we’re in the heat of summer. I suspect we all have selective memories when it comes to this. For example, upthread it was mentioned the summers being brutal lately. To me, it seems the summers are less brutal. I remember extreme hot spells in 1995 and then a few years before that, and now it feels like it doesn’t get over 100 as often as I remember.
I live in the DFW area (Dallas Fort Worth) and our spring has been more windy than usual, with a constant succession of bad storms moving through. It’s more frustrating than normal not just due to the threat itself, but the uncertainty of it all. The weather boffins are fairly accurate in predicting that someone in the region is getting hammered, but they can’t say where. So we watch grimly as a massive hail-producing thunderstorm makes a beeline for our house, only to swerve or fall apart at the last minute.
Although I’m relieved we’re not getting direct hits, it’s becoming tiring.
Explanation: In the last few years, we’ve lost 3 cars to accidents/storms, along with a months-long repair of our house (also storms). It’s difficult to explain just how violent these hailstorms can be, but I’ll include a pic of one of the cars below.
As a result, we’re on thin ice with our insurance company, and really don’t want another totaled auto. So we got a huge, temporary inflatable storm shelter for our truck. And we’re dragging the damned heavy thing out every other day to deploy and inflate it. Followed by drying it and returning it to storage. And it’s getting exhausting, both with the effort and the “do we or don’t we” decisions over and over.
A few weeks ago I drove down to the coast for a week of surf-fishing. 8 full days there, and the wind blew so hard every day it was impossible to cast into it. Even hanging out on the beach was just getting sandblasted.
I’m sick of the spring winds, and never thought I’d look forward to the summer heat.
You know how it is with travel - you generally just hope you packed appropriately - and to avoid the worst. Over 10 days from Paris down to Nice I wore long pants and short-sleeve shirts every day, with a light jacket most days and in the evenings. The only things I packed but didn’t wear were a pair of shorts and a sweatshirt. I think we got sprinkled on twice, neither time for long. And one of those times we were eating a marvelous dinner outside in a cafe under an awning, so it was no issue.
We discussed why Paris is so often described as so romantic in the spring. I mean, it is a really neat big city with a lot of neat stuff. But it is just a big city. Hate to say it, but not sure why it is any more/less romantic than a big city like Chicago or NYC. Paris has several wonderful parks, but the city in general is not really heavily planted, so I’m not sure why spring would be more romantic. My non-romantic opinion is that it is largely a successful PR effort.
You just might be shoveling snow - or hitting the beach - the next day.
