How do we manage to debate the merritts of hot vs. cold weather every goddamn season and never come to some sort of reasonable consensus on the matter? Surely there must be a correct answer to this question that’s been plaguing humanity throughout history.
I shiver when it drops below 70.
Hot weather is great when you’re at the beach or anytime you want to get wet and stay wet. Otherwise, it’s overrated.
This for sure. Plus temperatures in the 90s are relatively uncommon in Montreal. Today’s high is predicted to be 25 C (77 F) and that is fine with me. With thunderstorms, which is not.
Q: What is so rare as a day in June?
A: A day in April, September, or November. Rarer yet is a day in February.
I more hear warm and sunny, not hot and sticky. I think most people just don’t care for extremes, plus the baggage they bring. On the east coast US, I think many are fine with the milder spring and fall seasons. The height of summer can bring exceptionally high heat and humidity (air quality advisories), while winter (as with this past season), can be brutal and also hazardous to health. In any part of the country, that can mean everything from water shortages to hours long traffic and pileups.
But otherwise, I guess it’s because the sun brings life and all that other good stuff. Then again, people also love rainy days and a book/movie or something, so it balances out.
I only really mind the heat once it gets above about 92-93, and I have to be out in the sun. Then it’s miserable.
Up to that point, it’s just kind of warm, and I can sit outside with a book and watch my toddler play in his sandbox without much discomfort.
What I don’t like is the “high summer” weather around here (Dallas/Ft Worth). It’s HOT- almost always between 95-98, and often between 99-101. On occasion it even gets higher than 101, with stretches in 2011 and 2006(?) topping out at 112 and 108 respectively. Add to that relentless, bright, godawful sunlight that makes everything exposed to it even hotter- cars are in the 140-150 degree range, and every year some clown on the news does the egg frying on the asphalt trick to show how terribly hot it is.
What makes it really awful though, is that there’s not usually any rain from about mid-June through about mid-September. So we get this ridiculously hot and sunny weather for some 60+ days straight, with no change. Since we seem to be in perpetual drought, the landscape looks surprisingly like winter, except that the trees mostly keep their leaves. Grass is mostly brown though. I f$*2ing hate it; give me some good thunderstorms, wind and rain, or barring that some good cold weather.
But when Jack Frost blows cross the nation
Then’s the time for fornication!
About 75 is perfect.
When it gets warm, women wear less clothing.
'nuff said.
Heat by itself isn’t so bad. 95 degrees in August in Las Vegas, I can tolerate. 95 degrees in August in New York, on the other hand…
Of course, that assumes that it’s ever 95 degrees in August in Vegas, as opposed to 110.
I’m still giggling at the thought of those “hot humid Montreal summers”.
Yeah, I generally like it when there’s less clothing on myself and the opposite camp. It’s just nice to dress light and go about my business instead of all the cold weather rigamarole. Plus going out for stroll and some ice cream or whatever on a nice summer night can be pretty darn nice. That said, sun + wilting heat + humidity is more of something to be endured than enjoyed. I don’t know many people who actually prefer it.
Bikinis
This is not always a good thing.
I love the heat- no cumbersome jackets and hats and gloves to lug around. I’m able to enjoy BBQs and roof decks and sunshine. And summer nights are the best of all. You can stay outside as late as you like with no dropping temperatures to chase you off.
I even like the humidity. It feels sultry and languorous and glowy, like a dream.
I dunno. Last time I was in Montreal a couple years ago, it was pretty darned hot & humid, in the mid-to-upper 80s. I know that doesn’t seem like a lot, but I suffer in hot & humid. I’m much better in the humidity-less 110s of Phoenix, than upper-80s in a humid climate. Even today, it’s 82 in Chicago, and I’m dripping the instant I walk outside. I hate feeling sweaty, and that’s how I am the bulk of the summer here.
Well, for starters, a hot summer is just a hot summer. It doesn’t come with a cornucopia of crap like winters do. No snow. No sleet. No slush. No ice. Nothing to shut down the city. Nothing to cause the electricity to go off, sometimes for days and weeks at a time. No effect on driving. No mud tracked into the house because the ground is always wet. No ugly piles of black snow in parking lots, waiting until May for it to melt. No chains on car wheels. No worries about whether you’ll get off work in time as to get home before the blizzard hits.
I could go on and on, but you probably get the idea. Hot is just hot. But cold brings with it problems that you do not have otherwise.
So, for me, if it were a choice between “hot summers” and “cold winters”, I’ll take hot every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Those of you that choose both… suckers.
Where I live, mid-80s in summer is called a cool day. Our summers are typically longer, the average temperature is close to 10 degrees higher, with 92% humidity.
I have always spent my summers dreaming of autumn, as I hate the hot weather. But we recently had kids and bought a house with a pool, so now I’m in love with summer again.
You mean other than the severe thunderstorms, tornadoes and hurricanes, right?
I think you’re right that snowy winters are a bigger hassle, but hot brigs it’s own set of problems.
Eh, I’ve lived in Atlanta and San Antonio for decades and yet have had a day of no electricity because of the heat. People in hurricane-hit areas beg to differ, true, but hell, you don’t need a hot day to get a hurricane - just ask people who were hit by Hurricane Sandy in late October 2012.
Tornado season is from March-June, btw, and is more of a spring time issue.