Have advice for living in Northern US?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Chapstick chapstick chapstick.

Meaning, of course, lip balm in general. I happen to like Chapstick (post-reformulation, of course) but find a brand you like and wear it. If you own more than one coat, make sure you have enough tubes to have one in the pocket of each coat, AND in your schoolbag and/or purse.

Making snowballs:
I am of two minds on this.

  1. cloth/cotton/wool/knitted gloves have the advantage of getting better “traction” on the snowball so you can pack it and shape it, but they absorb water and get soggy and cold.

  2. leather/vinyl gloves have the advantage of not getting soggy, but I don’t find I can make a decent snowball with them because they are too slippery.

A mediocre compromise is the cloth gloves with leather/vinyl palms, but most of those available for purchase are kind of dorky.

And the hat thing: yes, they may make you feel goofy, but they will make you feel soooo much warmer. Ditto on scarves. Get one so that you won’t get drafts down your neck. Wrap it atound your neck and THEN put on your coat. Scarf on top of coat doesn’t work quite so well at stopping drafts.

When you arrive at class (I get the feeling you’re off to college?) stuff your hat, gloves and scarf in the sleeve of your jacket. That way they are less likely to get lost.

Also, when it’s snowing those big gloppy flakes, an umbrella is a great idea. On a warm-ish day, snow can make you soggy pretty quickly.

If you have to drive in snowy or icy weather, drive even more cautiously than you think you should. If you can avoid it, don’t drive.

One of the things my grad-school roommate from NC remarked on about living in Boston is that during summers it will get just as hot as it did in NC - about 90 with 99% humidity - but the AC she took for granted in most homes and almost all businesses back home was not as ubiquitous in the north. The laundromat we used had no AC, which I never thought twice about, until she started groaning about how damn hot it was in there. We looked for one with AC and didn’t ever find one.
Almost nobody has central AC unless they own a brandy-new house. So unless you’re living in a brandy-new dorm, don’t expect AC.

HTH!

22

What? THAT monstrosity? All you need are those tiny ones that can fit in your glovebox. You don’t need the brush, that’s why they put sleeves on jackets!

23

I admit, I prefer the ones that have the scraper at one end and the brush at the other, but I couldn’t find a picture of one of those. Yeah, the little ones are nice for small cars, but I have a van and need the extra reach. :slight_smile: We usually keep several in each vehicle, so we can both scrape at the same time.

(Weird to be talking about scraping ice off the car when I have the A/C going and it’s 90 degrees outside . . .)

24

My ex SIL returned recently from the Minneapolis area. She lived there for 3 years. She said the cold and heat were bearable but the part that drover her crazy were the mosquitos. She claims that they are so big there she saw 3 of them carry off a small child once.

25

I believe she’s pulling your leg.

Every Minnesotan knows it only takes one.

:wink:

26

:stuck_out_tongue: That about says it! I live in MN too, about 1.5 hours south, and it’s true, it does get very, very cold in the winter and very, very hot and humid in the summer, so be prepared to freeze and sweat. Salt for your driveway and sidewalks are good, however, if you run out, kitty liter works just as well…don’t ask me how I know that :smiley:

And welcome to the Great White North!!!

27

See this thread for details.

Robin

28

If you have a car, don’t forget the antifreeze. Cracked blocks are no fun. Make sure your battery is new and/or in good condition.

In winter give yourself an extra five/10 minutes to scrape frost off the windshield and warm up the car enough so that your breath doesn’t condense and freeze on the windshield making it hard to see.

Wind is not your friend once it gets cold.

29

Oh, yeah.

Buy this book. Read it. Study it. There will be a test.

:smiley:

30

Where in Minnesota?

31

I have that book.
It was given to me when I first arrived in MN.

Dats wer I lerned about bars(pastry), hotdish(casserole), lutefisk(eeeew), Spam(ack), Lena and Ole(heh?), plus a hollotta udder tings, ya, youbetcha…

Damn, dat was way back der in ‘86’, doncha know.:eek:

32

Jonmarzie, get ready for culture shock. As one who moved from the South (VA) to the north (WI) for college, take it from me. You will experience cold like you a=never imagined existed. The difference between -20 and 20 above is huge, almost indescribable. Imagine the difference between 72 and 32. It is severe, and don’t let those Northeners dissuade you. They are just used to it. Having said that, the severity of the weather is not that bad, it is the length of it. It can be cold from September until April. If Minnesota is like Madison, WI, be prepared for weeks and months of cold, cloudy weather, with only occasional sunny days. This is more difficult to endure than the extreme tempertures. Also, although WI and MN consider themselves progressive politically, there is almost no diversity of culture compared to what you, coming from Texas, consider normal. You will find racial ignorance to be an amazing problem (my experiences talking, YMMV).
Having said this, you will find that the people are extremely freindly and accomodating. Additionaly, the fact that summers are so short means that the people know how to pack as much fun in as is possible. I suggest staying there in the summer, you will get a different feel for the region.
Be open minded, consider the experience of the natives, and you will learn to love it. You may not want to live there forever, but you will understand the people and their beauty.

LM

33

I live in an area called the “snow belt” so here’s a few of my thoughts…

> What everyone else said, not a bad idea among them.

> Never buy any shirt, jacket, or coat without a hood.

>Find some friend(s) with a real wood fired outdoor sauna. The first time you visit and use it, you’ll understand why they invented these things.

>If you’re not used to driving in the snow, get used to the way your car breaks loose in a safe place like a big parking lot. I’d recommend getting a car with ABS if your car doesn’t have it. ABS is nearly useless in a place like So Cal but I really believe it’s saved my life twice.

>It takes time to get used to the cold, even for the hardiest. What felt like deathly cold in November will feel like a mere mild chill in February.

Doc

> You’ll get some good stories to tell your children and grandchildren.

34

Sleep indoors, or else the polar bears will eat you.

Some people will go out of their way to convince you that winter is a lovely season. Don’t listen to them. They’ve the victims of winter induced insanity. People survive winter by: a. complaining b. finding indoors hobbies that might be doable by the light of a hurricane lantern and fireplace once the friggin snow causes someone to skid out, hit a power line, and cause a black out which may last an hour or three days. Maybe you should develop a reading list and invest in some board games now. And a few hurricane lanterns before they sell out- they’re usually gone by the time the shovels are.

Lamar would be more correct to say some people get used to it; I’ve lived in the northeast (hey, we get less snow, than Minnesota so just imagine…) my entire life and I’ve yet to take less than a month to adjust to the cold. Expect to spend a lot of time after the temp drops wrapped in blankets when idle and trying to pile on warmer clothes until you develop a cold tolerance.

My sincerest advice to you, though, is that unless you absolutely must drive during a severe snow storm (howling winds, whiteouts, you know), don’t. There aren’t that many things worth going out in treacherous weather for.

On the plus side for winter there is snowball fights and sweaters, that’s about it though unless you ski.

35

The key to walking on ice is to place each foot squarely on the ground and avoid pushing in any direction.

I had to teach a lot of my california friends at school how to walk on slippery slopes. ALSO, never go out in the winter in boots/shoes with perfectly flat, slippery bottoms w/o tread. That’s just asking for a broken back.

P.S. Learn how to knit your own scarves. Fun!

36

Just thought of something else.

There’s a chance you’ll get stuck despite our “STAY HOME!!” warnings. More likely, however, you will have to be somewhere at 8 a.m. and your apartment’s management doesn’t plow your parking lot til 10 a.m. There’s also a chance your apartment’s management was actually on the ball that morning and plowed at 9, leaving you with a two-foot drift behind your car DESPITE the fact they claim they’ll start plowing at 10. If you absolutely positively must leave, and you find your car cannot, do NOT put your transmission into reverse and step on the gas.

**It will not work. **

Instead:

  1. Reverse for a few seconds til you realize you’re stuck.
  2. Sigh heavily and let loose a few curse words.
  3. Put your car into D til you hear the front spoiler hit the curb.
  4. Reverse.
  5. As you get to the ‘top’ or ‘end’ of your backwards motion, drop your transmission to D.
  6. When you hear your front spoiler hit the curb, go back to R.
  7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 until:
    …7) a. You manage to get unstuck (this is, BTW, an excellent “I was late because…” story).
    …7) b. You remember the bit about ‘kitty litter’ from the myriad news reports about “what you should have in your car” right before the first snow fall. At this point you…
    …1. Remember the dozen times you’ve passed the kitty litter at Cub or Rainbow and smack yourself upside the head for not actually BUYING any (see 7) c.).
    …2. Put a bit of kitty litter behind your rear tires.
    …7) c. You decide it’s JUST NOT WORTH IT and go back to your room with a bottle of peppermint schnapps and some hot chocolate and call where ever you’re supposed to be and blame your Southerness for your absence.

That’s it, really.

Um. Don’t panic. You’ll know what I mean once you actually get in that situation :smiley:

37

I’m also a Texan that moved up North for a while. Cold didn’t bother me… I loved it. The darkness is what kicked my ass. So don’t try out your Texas night owl schedule up North, it will make you an insane wreck. You only think you hate the sun.

Oh, and stay for the summer so you can have a chuckle when they say how hot it is… their average high temps in the summer are roughly what you would be setting your AC at in Texas during those same months :slight_smile:

They win with mosquitoes and snow though.

-fh

38

Chains are not just a sexual toy. They are attached to tires for traction while driving.

39

When clearing your windows, clear ALL your windows - all the way around. Clear the snow off your hood and roof as well, so you don’t have snow blowing onto your windsheild, or an avalanche over it the first time you have to stop.

40

All of the above, plus:

Remember, there is no such thing as Minnesota fashion. At all. Ever.

Go rent Fargo and look at what people are wearing. Realize that although it’s 1987 in the movie, it might as well be a documentary filmed last Thursday.

Y’see, people know what it’s like when the weather forecasters warn that you should not leave any skin exposed for more than one minute. And they carry that lesson forward into the rest of the year, too.

On the other hand, one good thing about Minnesota weather is that it’s pretty easy to arrange your life so that you’re never actually in it. You go from your heated garage to your heated car to your heated parking “ramp” (what the rest of the world calls a garage) to your heated office to your heated shopping mall, repeat as necessary. It gets a little dull, but you don’t complain because you are living in the Land of Keeping It In. Which is a good thing.

Unlike, say, New York, where although the weather is much milder, you can’t avoid being in it for key parts of the day. And you complain bitterly, because you’re in the Land of Therapized Release.

Countcher blessings. :smiley:

Oxy, Carleton College '90