My moods are affected by the weather more than most people. I grew up in South Louisiana where it's as humid as a jungle most of the year and hot enough for bugs to breed year round. It depressd me. I spent four years in San Diego where the weather was pretty much perfect for the entire four years and I loved it and was happy most of the time but I just couldn't afford to live there. I lived in Seattle for a year where it didn't rain as much as people say it does, but it was grey all of the time. I lived in Orlando for a year and not only was it hot and humid as hell there, but there were daily violent thunderstorms to go along with it. Now I live in Chicago where it's either hot as hell or cold as hell. Currently, I'm stuck with nothing to do because there is a foot of snow on the ground and my car just won't make it out of the alley, and if I do, I'm limited to only going places that have a plowed parking area, which really doesn't exist in Chicago. Seems like just a month ago I was bitching about how hot it was here and how I coudn't get my apartment to cool down enough to get to sleep, and now I'm bitching about it being too cold or snowy. Chicago is a city of extremes when it comes to the weather. It's either too hot or too cold for me. Spring and Fall don't hang around very long here. My point is that everywhere I've ever lived, besides San Diego, I've pretty much complained or had negative reactions to the weather almost every day. I'm beginning to wonder if it's what's making me seem depressed all of the time. People are always asking me what's wrong or trying to pry an answer out of me as to why I seem upset about something or whatever, but man I honestly think that most of the time I'm just uncomfortable with the damned weather. Seems stupid but I wasted an entire day off today just sitting in my apartment feeling pissed about the weather outside and not going out and doing anything. Extreme heat and extreme cold make me feel trapped and wanting to do nothing more than sit inside doing nothing. Rain gives me headaches and fucks with my sinuses. I don't think that I can take more than maybe a couple of more years in Chicago. I could never live in Louisiana again. I've done the whole west coast thing. I don't care much for the East coast. Where in the hell can I possibly move to that I'm not going to bitch about the weather everyday? I hear Arizona gets pretty hot but can it really be all that bad without the humidity that the south gets? Any ideas? Colorado?
john [email] said at 9:02 PM 02-01-2008: If you're wondering why I need my car to get places in Chicago, it's because they've closed the nearest train station to my apartment for an ENTIRE year for repairs. Real nice. And the buses don't come that often, especially when it's cold.
rick [email] said at 9:19 PM 02-01-2008: Hawai'i. But expect to pay a mint for the privilege of living in the Aloha State.
Santa Cruz looks nice.
The two times I went to 'frisco, it was absolutely gorgeous but both times were in the summer. However, there is no snow out there (personally with me, it's not so much cold as dryness; I don't know if I could deal with a dry cold like North Dakota or the steppes of Siberia).
You might want to think about finding a high altitude place in an otherwise warm region. I have heard nice things about the mountains of North Carolina.
john [email] said at 9:55 PM 02-01-2008: I'm a fan of northern California. I spent a lot of time in San Francisco in the early 90s whilst in the Navy. Man,that sounds pretty gay. Myriam and I were just in San Fransisco and San Jose last weekend. It rained the whole time but we had fun. I was shocked to see how many of the places I used to frequent no longer exist in North Beach. It had been several years since my last visit there and I had trouble not getting lost because the places that I used to use as marks for navigation are out of business now or something esle. I was really excited to show Myriam and her friends my little coffee shop that I used to hang out at in North Beach, but when we got there, I was saddened to see that it no longer exists. Made me feel old. I like Hawaii but my ship spent a few months there in 94 and I remember it getting pretty humid and hot and I was wanting to leave after a while.
john [email] said at 9:48 PM 02-01-2008: Yeah, I spent 4 years there back when I was in the Navy from 91 to 95. I had a place in Point Loma. I could watch the fireworks at SeaWorld sitting on my balcolny every night. I fucking loved it. It's definetely something to consider again. I could probably land a decent job this time around if I did it again.
boudet [email] said at 12:18 PM 02-03-2008: yeah, i've been in SD for 8 months and no complaints at all. Even being from south Louisiana where I was SO sick of the rain and humidity, now I welcome a little rain here and there because it's not every afternoon in the summer. In fact, it's raining right now.
brandon [email] said at 10:04 PM 02-01-2008: In Chicago, I worked with a girl who had moved to Phoenix and thought it was the best weather ever. Really, really hot, but never sauna-ish.
I used to get really terribly depressed in Chicago during the winter. I loved the summers. I'd spend as much time out as possible. It's a tough city climate-wise.
If I had to choose a place, it weren't for the old people and the hurricanes, I'd live in Florida.
john [email] said at 10:31 PM 02-01-2008: My first winter up here was ok. It was a nice break from Louisiana's humid and unseasonably warm winters and it was neat seeing the snow having lived without it my whole life. But now it's my third winter and I'm sick of it. Florida is ok sometimes but summers there are hot as shit. When I was living in Orlando it was like the same pattern everyday: Hot, hotter, unbearably hot, huge thunderstorm, breif period of a cool off, then hot again, repeat.....
myriam [email] said at 1:01 PM 02-02-2008: Ha ha, you actually have a good point, come to think of it. The whole med region is spectacular, weather-wise. All the way out to Portugal...
ben said at 12:46 PM 02-02-2008: man, this post reads like i could have written it.
i feel the exact same about places / weather / moods. i hole up all winter in baltimore / dc, and then love it during the summer and come out of my cave. I agree that California weather is perfect, and definitely never get bummed out there. Also feel the same about moving back there. Hard to move back to a place you feel like you've already been.
I'm in New Orleans right now, and the weather is a lot warmer (during winter which I guess this is) than I remember it. But again, I don't think I could ever move back here as much as I might want to.
Definitely don't think I could deal with Chicago, but even still, have been threatening to move to NY for several years which I imagine is almost as bad.
But yeah, got me? Lemmie know when you figure it out. I would love to live somewhere that didn't bum me out half of the year. Best I've come up with is living somewhere cheap and trying to travel around constantly during the bad months...
anthony [email] said at 3:02 PM 02-06-2008: I don't know where you should live. San Diego indeed did have great weather when I was there. Maybe if you didn't mind, you could move to a smaller coastal town in California?
I personally miss the extreme humidity and heat of South Carolina. I guess I had just grown used to it as a fact of life and whenever it gets like that around here in DC and I get to walk around in boxers and flip flops with fans oscillating to wick the sweat off of me, I get nostalgic and slow down a bit.
Chicago winters are awful, but I figure the summers have to more than make up for it.
john [email] said at 7:07 PM 02-07-2008: I'll be out of credit card debt in two years and that will free up a ton of money for me to make a move more comfortably. I like the smaller west coast city idea, something close enough to a bigger city to not feel isolated, yet not so close that I get caught in the traffic. With my company, I'm able to transfer and keep my same salary, etc. to many different cities. It's just a matter of where positions are available when I'm ready to leave here. You're right, the winters are awful at times. Most people here seem to absolutely love the summers, but I honestly hate them almost as much as the winters because it gets really hot and there really aren't apartments with central ac here. My little window unit just doesn't do anything. There are also waaaaaay too many festivals happening pretty much everyday of the summer. The first couple are fun, but then it's like, ok, stop it with the damned festivals already! They block random streets without warning for this crap and transportation is always crowded with drunk Depaul students and drunk as hell baseball fans. In a city with TWO pro baseball teams, there is a game EVERYDAY in the summer and the trains are PACKED with annoying White Sox or Cubs fans. So, winter is the weather, and summer is the annoyingly huge crowds and heat. I'm tired of it. San Diego would be nice again if I could swing it.
