Rivers of blood, years of darkness - I mean the winter solstice

Yes, it’s that time of year again. I try to tell myself that it’s only another month and the days will start getting longer, but really it’s another month after that until we’re really back to where we are now essentially. So much for trying to bullshit myself.

Except then I checked the Farmer’s almanac online (defaults to Dublin, NH) and found this interesting tidbit for where I live, which is roughly between NY and Philadelphia. Checking the sunset for Nov and Dec on the 21st in each month, there is a difference of only about a minute. In both cases the sunset is just past 4:30PM. But when you go out to January 21st of 2014, it jumps up to 5PM and change.

Of course the change in the length of the day from Nov to Dec and back to Jan is still roughly 30minutes, plus or minus, so there’s no magic here, but I though that was interesting. As the days get shorter, the minutes come off the early part of the day and as they get longer, they get added on to the long end.

I’m sure this has something to do with the earth moving through the ecliptic plane but my mental 3D simulator is down at the moment. :o

Bottom line: This shit still sort of bums me out. Not seriously, but I do occasionally like to see the sun. And since I tend to stay up late and get up late and can be a little depressing to get up past noon and only have like 2 hours of actual daylight. I know, I know. It’s my own damn fault. But I’ll go to bed early when they pry the remote from my Cheeto encrusted fingers. :smiley:

I dunno, I kind of enjoy the changing of the seasons and wouldn’t really want to live somewhere with permenantly good weather.

The weather doesn’t really get awful around here until February - OK, let’s say predictably awful. Anything from December to March is pretty much fair game as far as freezing rain, sleet, snow, etc. goes. Although this year I have to say that things are looking pretty good for a mild winter. Should proably see what the Farmer’s Almanac has to say and see what the long range seasonal forecast is. Those seem to have been getting better in recent years.

Anyway, I can live with the bad weather. If I get snowed in, I just hide for a few days until they plow my street. It’s not a big deal. And central heating makes up for a lot of seasonal shortcomings as well - except lack of sunshine. :frowning:

I enjoy the changes of the seasons, but Madame Pepperwinkle has SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder) and has to plug in a natural sunlight lamp for a couple hours a day or she gets seriously depressed.

I can’t say that I have SAD, but late fall and winter are the low points of the year for me. I’ve had great times in the middle of winter, but I prefer warmth and longer days.

Iono. Things are getting weird weather-wise anymore. Tornadoes in Feb and Nov? Shits not sposed to go like that. I hate winter especially in the dead of Feb when its colder than frozen hell and ice everywhere. Power outs possible when that happens and dangerous driving on ice here in the Plains.

I get up around 0600 just to watch the sun come up & try to enjoy it as much as possible since it doesnt last long now. Lying around in bed all morning is just a waste.

I don’t mind the weather - I like storms, I like ice, I like frost. (We never get snow here.)

I don’t particularly LIKE the cold, but it’s an excuse to wear all of my nifty layers and fun coats and take long hot showers and snuggle under mountains of blankets, all of which I DO like, so that makes up for that.

What I mind is the darkness. The unrelenting everlasting oh my god it’s only 6:15 and it feels like it’s 9 Fucking O’Clock At Night, can I go to bed yet, dear god I’m going to turn into a mushroom, if I don’t get some light I might just die endless darkness. It sucks the life right out of me.

(On the other hand, because of whoever’s post it was a few weeks back, I actually bought a real SAD light instead of using a full-spectrum bulb, and it’s making a huge difference. I only feel mildly annoyed and stabbity so far, rather than my usual apathetic melt into the couch depression. We’ll see how it goes around February.)

I feel exactly the same, Lasciel. The cold doesn’t particularly bother me, but the longer I live in Maine, the more I feel really *tired *or something from the lack of light. I’m going to look into that SAD bulb thing. I feel like winter JUST started and I’m already completely sick of this darkness.

I mind the darkness too. I don’t like snow much anymore, but it is still pretty and sometimes occasions a free day off work. But the unrelenting dark…and we have to work through it. We should be able to switch our hours in the winter!

I celebrate a festival of lights - in the West it’s called Christmas - exactly because of this reason. I would celebrate something most anywhere, I think. I’m sure that’s where the celebration came from - humans sitting together in the dark.

Ever since the Winter from Hell - 2007-2008 - when we got something like 140 inches (or was it 104?) of snow in southern Wisconsin, I have loathed winter and start getting depressed in approximately September. It’s barely light when I leave for work, pitch black when I go home, AND my office window faces north, so I get NO sun. If it weren’t for my mom, sons and granddaughter, my SO and I would move south. Maybe not the deep south, but souther anyway.

Today I woke up to a bone-shattering 45-degrees, only to find out that the temperature is going to plummet… yes, plummet… tonight to around 39-degrees.

Oh, well. It’s not like late-January is too far away, when the temps start rising and I can start grilling out again.

(Sorry, but if I lived in a place with perfect weather all the time, that would be AWESOME.)

“The sky is clearing and the night has gone out.
The sun, he come, the world is all full of light.
Rejoice, rejoice, we have no choice but to carry on.”

CSNY

I grew up north of Minneapolis, but live in Chicago now. I also don’t mind cold or snow, but the lack of sun gets to me. The cloudiness of Chicago makes it worse. In Minnesota it might be -30F, but at least there’s blue sky and the sun is out.

In 2007 I moved. It was only about 100 miles, but it put me from the western edge of one time zone into the eastern edge of another, and oh my GOD I hate it. Dark at 5:30 I can live with, dark at 4:30 is just crazy talk.

I let myself go to a tanning salon in the month of January. That kind of gets me over the hump and makes February possible. Then it’s March, and DST goes back into effect, thank Og.

It’s depressing, especially since the dog died three weeks ago. It’s going to be a long, cold, dark winter. We have a trip to Socal scheduled in December but when we come back it’s straight back to work and the three most depressing months of the year.

I’m in Minneapolis.