The Spirit issue with the Spirit lying in an alley all day with a gunshot wound during a New York heatwave was great.
New York still has a shocking amount of non-airconditioning, at least for the modern-day equivalent class of people described in the article.
You think you would like to have been there but gah that area of the country is not habitable in August.
I would like to have been there and slept in the park with everyone.
White privilege!
I can't dig up a quote, but I seem to recall an H. L. Mencken piece where he praises air conditioning as one of the greatest advances of modern civilization.
This reminds me a little of one of the bits of Agee Samuel Barber uses in Knoxville: Summer of 1915.
"On the rough wet grass of the back yard my father and mother have spread quilts. We all lie there, my mother, my father, my uncle, my aunt, and I too am lying there....They are not talking much, and the talk is quiet, of nothing in particular, of nothing at all.....with voices gentle and meaningless like the voices of sleeping birds."
RWM hates summer, and particularly hated NYC summer. Our new town (which needs a pseud) has roughly the same temperature range in the summer as NYC, which I was worried would be a problem. Turns out just not being NYC improves things immensely. Temperature drops better at night due to lack of heat island, no waiting on subway platforms, no hot garbage smell everywhere, central air, etc. Same high temperatures but without all the miserable.
It feels a bit ridiculous complaining about English summer heat compared to New York's, but without air conditioning it really has been hellish trying to sleep the last week or so. I can't even open the windows in my bedroom because they're floor to ceiling and I'm on the ground floor.
A lot of folks complain about the fact that SF doesn't have a "real" summer, but then I remember the hell that is NYC at 90 degrees and 100% humidity, and I happily shrug into my long-sleeve shirt and jacket. Fuck that noise.
Topically, it is 64 right now in Pittsburgh. After the last couple of weeks, I'm so glad. I still think I'm going to try to swim this afternoon.
72 degrees every day in summer sounds like heaven to me.
In fairness to New York, it's rarely the hellish combination of heat and humidity it was last week. The hot garbage smell is something I won't miss, though. Or maybe Oakland is garbagey and I won't have to miss it, I don't know.
(My memories of Town Where I Seem To Remember Unfoggetarian Lives in summer is that the heat and humidity were pretty brutal. Also speaking of Unfoggetarian now that I am doing evil British crosswords ((slowly, angrily)) things sometimes look like evil British crossword clues that aren't.)
Our secret.
That comic seems to have confused San Francisco with Santa Barbara.
15.2. "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) is a cryptic crossword clue. Did you not solve it?
I am also glad that it is not awfully hot this week. A garbage truck went by me on my walk to work yesterday, and the fumes off of it, which lingered in the vicinity long after it had passed, were enough to gag a maggot. Horrid.
Copenhagen sounds like a perfect climate to me -- hat and gloves in the winter, but no danger of your eyelids freezing to your glasses, and pleasant upper-60s to lower-70s summers.
71 degrees outside right now. Admittedly, we have about 1 1/2 months of somewhat unpleasant (but really not that bad) weather that hasn't started yet.
Certainly the summer weather here is objectively pretty bad (humidity is high, highs are a few degrees higher than in NYC, but lows are a few degrees lower), but the point is that it's not just a simple correlation between weather and miserableness. Just taking subway platforms out of the equation is a huge difference.
11: Yes, a nice shot of "Polar" air* for this time of year. Significant enough to influence the east coast (Central Park slated to go lower than 70 this evening for first time in nearly two weeks--normal is 69).
*They really blew it on airmass names -- The "Polar" ones that affect the US are actually generally over the North Pacific, Canada and the North Atlantic, over the pole is the "Arctic" airmass.
The downside of Copenhagen is that that mild winter comes with extreme darkness.
I think the best summer weather in the US is Seattle (slightly warmer than the bay area). For year-round maybe Santa Fe?
Not counting Hawaii, of course.
San Diego (the city, not way inland in the county) has unquestionably the best year-round weather.
As shown here.
Santa Monica is also very good..
By comparison with Santa Fe, NM.
I think the best summer weather in the US is Seattle (slightly warmer than the bay area).
Anyone who doesn't think the best summer weather in the US is in Northern Michigan either has never been to Northern Michigan in the summer or is stupid.
You forgot about people who have never been anywhere other than Northern Michigan in the summer, unless that counts as stupid.
Halford's right that it seems difficult to beat San Diego year round, if you like your weather to be forever boringly pleasant.
25: Yes, I think there are a string of non-fog-favored coastal places along the southern half of California that are best year round for continental l US. How far they extend inland controlled by local topography. I lived in Fullerton and found it pretty good--a bit far inland, but with an attic fan very tolerable without AC except for a few anomalous nights in the summer.
27: That area still gets caught up in the uncomfortable humid air masses from time to time unlike Seattle.
I would take Santa Fe weather over East Coast weather. (I worry about all of New Mexico drying up and burning, but set that aside.) East Coast weather produces some nice moments, but it is generally hell. Summers and winters suck. Spring is too wet and too short. Fall is generally quite nice unless something goes wrong, like heatwave, early snow, or hurricane. I am so fucking happy to be almost done with East Coast weather.
27: And I've been there quite a bit in the summer. (But yes, it is generally quite pleasant although "summer" can end a bit early; it got to near freezing at the end of August on one trip to the UP).
uncomfortable humid air masses from time to time
This is essential in order to make an occasional swim in a lake that much more pleasant.
I would like to live in Santa Fe because I've always wanted something adobe.
(Full disclosure: I've never actually been to Michigan.)
Yeah, I'm happy to admit I was wrong on the San Diego point.
I've just developed strong opinions on their weather based on field reports.
34: Like at 2 AM when you can't sleep because the vacation cottage doesn't have AC.
That said, I do think there's an argument to be made for seasons over not-seasons assuming you actually get the pleasant version of the season. (Of course, it's really hard to find places where you get the pleasant version of all seasons. In particular, everywhere with a great fall has at least two other terrible seasons.)
Montana is lovely in the summer. But so is northern Michigan.
re: 9
It's pretty nasty at the moment. It was 29 degrees (c) in our bedroom a couple of nights ago, and has been averaging 26 or 27 every night for a week or two.
I wake up literally soaked in sweat, as if I'm suffering from some sort of 19th c. ague.
re: 22
Hah. Copenhagen is about the same latitude as northern England.
It's not really that far off in longitude either.
Northern England is also really dark. Hell, Belgium is pretty dark in the winter.
My never-to-be-actually-built retirement website project has a lot of neat ways to compare and contrast climate and weather information that are right up this alley.
You've gotta keep in mind that NYC is south of Rome. Europe is just a dark dark place in the winter.
This is essential in order to make an occasional swim in a lake that much more pleasant.
Like at 2 AM when you can't sleep because the vacation cottage doesn't have AC.
It's like you guys are brainstorming for Friday The 13th Part XV.
Just taking subway platforms out of the equation is a huge difference.
I'm a little bit sheltered from this because my subway station is way underground, so it's never terribly hot or cold. (Compensating factors include the guy who shuffles around by the doors of the entrance and occasionally shouts at people and the guy who sits in the tunnel playing I-vi-ii-V* on his guitar incessantly and singing "everybody have a good day today....everybody have a good day today....everybody have a good day today" &c &c &c, and the weird way the tunnel gets incredibly wet and slippery and low hanging fruity in wet weather.)
*this may be totally wrong.
And of course the fact that my subway station is in my neighborhood.
I have to stand outside and catch the bus like a hobo.
51: Canonically, I believe it is "like a schnook"
The bindle was supposed to be a hint that I wanted a new messenger bag for Christmas, but nobody got the message.
You should get a ReLoad bag, they're awesome. Or a Black Rose -- made by anarchists!
Isn't Northern Michigan kind of humid? I guess that's not as much of an issue if it doesn't get too hot.
We've had a very hot month now, but so long as you can get yourself into the river every day, it's not so bad. (I have AC in my office, but not my house. Temps in the 50s every night, anyway, so sleeping isn't an issue). One has to be careful, though, when visiting EMo the Redneck Riviera.
re: 49
Rhythm changes! Also a pretty generic pop or folky-pop sort of progression.
Myrtle Beach was what I heard was the Redneck Riviera.
The guy who told me would make White Castle Pâté, so I figured him as an expert.
Not Panama City?
It's a 40 minute float or so from the fishing access in East Missoula to downtown, and on a hot afternoon, hundreds of people make the trip.
Which reminds me, I need to head down to the river for lunch (with music) right now.
60.1: Florida had to moved into its own class for that kind of stuff.
Converting to Fahrenheit, it's 84 or 85 in our bedroom at night. Which is shite.
Annoyingly, right now I have the windows closed because the 'kids' [I think actually in their early 20s] two doors up are rapping in their back-garden studio. Where rapping seems to mean screaming tunelessly and out of time over some beats.
62: That's only six degrees above what we keep our AC at, though the AC does cut the humidity nice. Also, I sneak it lower than 78 when my wife isn't looking.
60.1: Yeah, Redneck Riviera is Florida Panhandle area, and most include Alabama Gulf Coast east of Mobile Bay.
For decades he has been a part-time resident and full-time observer of the Gulf Coast from Mobile Bay eastward to Panama City on the Florida panhandle - a strip of seashore dubbed the "Redneck Riviera" by New York Times Editor Howell Raines (!!-JPS) in a 1978 article about the offseason antics of NFL quarterbacks Ken Stabler and Richard Todd.
re: 64
I think there's a threshold. I find that anything from 18C (65F) to about 23C (74F) is comfortable enough to sleep in. As it goes much below or much above it starts get unpleasant. In the SE of England, we can keep our bedroom in that range most of the time with normal use of heating in winter, and windows open in summer. It's too hot now, though, for that to work.
According to the BBC, the current humidity where we are is about 50%.
The climate in northern Utah is fantastic. It's been hot and humid (for here) lately, but there's so much sunshine! And in winter, when it snows, the snow goes away when the sun comes out! Hurray powder snow!
It's currently 68 degrees regular.
I'd better go get a hot chocolate.
I dunno, a red spotted handkerchief bindle and a stoneware jug would be... I guess they would be hipster.
The actual slung-under-the-boxcars hobos I saw, midnights, in the 90s, had stoneware jugs.
68: Word. A lot of people here have never lived anywhere else and don't appreciate it.
You've gotta keep in mind that NYC is south of Rome. Europe is just a dark dark place in the winter.
I guess we're just used to it. When I think "dark in winter", I'm thinking of Iceland or Norway. Arctic Circle, basically.
I dunno, a red spotted handkerchief bindle
Left shoulder or right shoulder, big boy?
68, 72: my only issue with the climate in Colorado was the huge snowstorms every year in late spring. Other than that, the weather was exceptionally good year-round. Sure, it got pretty cold for a week or two each winter, but that was a small price to pay to have seasons (suck it, San Diego). Anyway, does Utah have those late-season storms -- it must, right? -- because staying up all night and banging snow out of the poor trees that had foolishly leafed out early in May really sucked.
Why not let evolution lead to smarter trees?
76: you'll have to ask the Lorax, Moby. He speaks for the trees.
Why not let evolution lead to smarter trees?
The last old-Florida family I know there still doesn't have air conditioning. They never cut down the sparse piney woods, so it's always shaded. Also, the house is very nearly a windscoop in all directions.
Hurricane-resistant, too. And none of their neighbors have copied them, not in decades.
It feels a bit ridiculous complaining about English summer heat
I will complain, loudly. This humidity is more miserable than all of the time spent at my parents in California in 40 C plus weather without air conditioning. (I suspect I would not do well in New York.)
My grandmother was a Key West native (born, 1919). Her and her family made it sound like a deserted isle when she was growing up -- they've never really adjusted to what Florida has become since air conditioning.
A lot of people here have never lived anywhere else and don't appreciate it. cutely ask me if I've seen snow before.
81: My grandmother was a Key West native (born, 1919). Her and her family made it sound like a deserted isle when she was growing up
Hmm, well yes, it was only connected by rail in 1912 (which became a highway in 1938), but compared to other cities in Florida it was fairly well-populated. Population of 18,000 in 1900 and biggest "city" in Florida compared to ~25,000 population today. But for Florida overall and south Florida in particular it is very true. Miami was 2,000 in 1900 and only 29,000 in 1920 (over 100K by 1930).
83: Could well have been nostalgia colouring their memories, though that's still not very populated compared to Cleveland, where she ended up!
I'm glad I'm getting out of here (Zurich) before it brushes 40C this weekend, since useful AC seems to be illegal. OTOH, it would be a great time to go jump in a lake (as the hotel staff super-politely and sincerely suggested to me).
84: Well, certainly a Key West connected only via rail to a very sparsely populated south Florida would be quite a different place despite the actual population. It was actually as much in the orbit of Havana (to which it is a fair bit closer than Miami). Pan Am airways founded there in the late '20s with an inaugural route between Key West and Havana.
Well, certainly a Key West connected only via rail to a very sparsely populated south Florida would be quite a different place despite the actual population.
No idea of order, for one thing.
The Bitches have been deposited on the river and are presumably tubing their way back to our house.
The invention of air conditioning was a necessary precondition for the the migration of white northerners to the Sun Belt, the second most momentous demographic event of the latter half of the 20th century, the reverberations of which are still being felt in our politics.
Subject of a classic article (link to a google search that may or may not help you find a copy of the article).
86: Yeah, that branch of the family is Anglo-Irish via the Bahamas, I believe. (Or maybe some other island. My memory is apparently as hazy as her's was.) Lots of tales of uninhabited keys, lobster bakes, wreckers and lighthouse keepers.*
*Great-great-grandfather was one such. Oh, romantic life, that ends with lead poisoning via water barrel.
Missed the 33 degree heat in London; had the 30 degree heat in Hamburg. This is the second year running I went to Germany and got a deep tan. That said, the city stank.
OTOH, it would be a great time to go jump in a lake (as the hotel staff super-politely and sincerely suggested to me).
No matter how hot it gets here, if you jump in the river, you come up cold. If you do it in the late evening, you can forget the whole hot day.
Megan, have you done any camping up in the Klamath Mountains? The Smith River is fantastic, a great river for swimming holes.
Regarding crappy east coast weather, I wish it would stop raining. It hasn't stopped since I moved into my new place, and the front door has been sticking since day one. But I don't know how much of the sticking is from humidity vs. sucky doorness, so I'm reluctant to plane* the door bottom until I know what it looks like not-waterlogged.
*Is that the right word? Really I mean asking my dad to teach me how one goes about fixing a door that sticks at the bottom.
I live right next to a river, but we have had so much rain that I haven't been able to get in it much. Very sad.
Regarding crappy east coast weather, I wish it would stop raining.
This has been a bizarrely rainy summer down here. Usually we're into drought-driven water restrictions by this point in the summer so I guess I shouldn't complain, but they're going to have to change the state flower to a mushroom if this keeps up.
I've had trouble keeping a dry pair of shoes, but today was just beautiful so far. I walked to work in the sun without it being warm enough to sweat.
Our average precip for July is 1.09 inches. Thus far this month we've had .039. In May we got .09 of our average 1.95 inches.
I can't bring myself to do anything at work right now and it's too hot to step outside. So here's a mediocre translation of the song I'm humming to myself:
On hot summer nights
Nothing else going on
Perhaps a star winks out
Through the open window
Perhaps a cricket is heard far away
But even the clock does not tick
On hot summer nights
Nothing else going on
Beneath the village berry tree
We sit and chat
Read a book with the scent of old pages
Close our eyes and keep silent
Nothing else going on
On hot summer nights
Beneath the village berry tree
We sit and chat
What I remember changing in Florida in the 1970s, as the pre-air people got outnumbered, was the old schedule -- work in the early mornings and the long evenings, but nap or laze in the day. Unless one was on the water. But when I was a kid, there were a lot more fish. Also, people still went outdoors when I was a kid. Going back as a grownup, and walking the old route down to the beach, we only met Caribbean cooks on bicycles -- "You all aren't from around here, are you? You keep your hats on!"
Key West might have been its quietest at the last turn of the century, since the transcontinental railways had finally killed off the coastal steam lines and land links hadn't been made yet. IIRC, it was an important stop for East-West loops as well as a link into the rest of the Caribbean.
64: That's only six degrees above what we keep our AC at, though the AC does cut the humidity nice. Also, I sneak it lower than 78 when my wife isn't looking.
Yes, AC correctly proportioned for the space should get you down below the 50% humidity on days when it runs for a sufficient period of time. A relatively easy set of numbers to remember is 80°F at 50% humidity is 60°F dewpoint. Which is about the top end of most people's comfort range (probably a couple of degrees cooler indoors if no significant air flow).
I've been prepping the spare room to paint. It turns out it is much hotter near the top of a 15 foot ceiling. Also, that I have to break the "Don't Stand On This" rule about the second from the top step.
I'm in west Wales, and it's lovely, mid twenties, and so much fresher than the sweaty hell hole I'd been in for the previous couple of weeks. *smug*
