Time To Get Out The Winter Coats
I'm freezing in Florida!!! What the heck? I moved here thinking all was going to be warm and cozy and it's cooooold here right now. It's still the Sunshine State but with a bitter kick to the Sunshine right now. We dug out the winter gear yesterday for the first time and today is even colder. I heard there may be some spitting snow on the coast.......of Florida?
We saw this coming for days as they warned us of the freeze to come saying it would be the coldest weather in the last five years. Grrrrrr.....I thought I was leaving all that behind. A few nights ago I was walking around the neighborhood outside with my friend who came to visit from NH. We were barefooted, in our pajama bottoms, and we stayed out for over an hour just walking around at 10 o'clock at night. It was awesome. She loved it.
Honestly tho, I'm not really complaining. I know what I left behind is much worse than what we have here. I've been on the phone daily with the folks back home and they are digging out and have been digging out the whole month of December with the heaviest snowfall ever setting a record even. They have over four feet on snow in their yards. One friend said...."if we have one more snowstorm, get your spare room ready." At first we teased them with talk of the warmth here but now I'm just feeling really badly for our friends back home. I wish I were there to help them dig out especially the single ladies or older folk.
The last few winters in Maine have been very light in the area of snowfall. In fact, many are saying they have already pulled out their snow shovels/blowers more this year than all of last year. I remember after finally breaking down and buying a snowblower last year we only used it maybe four times. When I sold it this fall before we left, it still looked brand new. Somebody got a good deal. Who knew we'd end up in Florida? If we did, we never would have bought that snowthrower in the first place.
So here it's maybe 40 (if that) outside and windy. Yesterday it was about the same. In Florida? It about killed me to turn on the heat this morning. I probably wouldn't have if it were for myself. But my 22 year old son was cold. Of course he's sitting here in a tee shirt working on his computer so he's not moving around. Last night he was complaining he was cold, but he had no socks on and was wearing shorts. I told him unless he put on pants and a sweater I wasn't going to turn up the heat so he'd feel warm in his shorts. It wasn't that cold. It was 66 in the house. That's not freezing. With oil prices the way it is I'm sure there are alot of people back home with their heat turned way down this year to conserve it.
There's alot of worry here, of course, about the citrus. If it freezes that's it for the crop and from what I've heard, the trees are never ok after that. They are useless. Yes you still may get oranges but you wouldn't want to eat them. In Maine, the apples are actually better after the first frost. Citrus is another matter.
Not surprisingly I haven't heard one mention of globabl warming lately. I guess it's a seasonal topic for the most part. We don't hear much about it during these cold winter months. I think right now most of the country is more concerned with global cooling not warming.
For me, I more than happy to see globabl warming come back because it's freezing down here.