It was another lovely early-spring day, a couple months early. It was 36°F when I took Anya to the dog park in my green wool jacket and a hat. As I've said before, I kind of rank the weather on what kind of clothing I need. Today was a medium-weight coat day. Anya enjoyed smelling all the smells...
I've gone on and on about life in winter up here in Minnesota, but it gets cold elsewhere. We took a trip to Cedar Key, Florida in January 2008, and it was definitely warm, but it was light windbreaker weather, not walk-around-in-your-skivvies weather. Cedar Key is in the northern part of Florida, but still...
Florida had a cold winter last year, especially in December 2010. Tropical imports like iguanas and pythons began dropping from the trees, which is good if you're trying to maintain local native species. How do you stay warm in a world where it almost never gets this cold? The advice is pretty much the same as anywhere: layer, keep your core temperature up with hot food, stop drafts...
The average annual low temperature (on average, the coldest it gets in winter) is the basis of the USDA's hardiness zones, which have just been revised. Note that almost none of the US avoids a freeze in an average winter: New Orleans, Orlando, Dallas and Palm Springs, CA, are all within the zone that in a typical winter gets down to between 25 and 30°F.
How do people stay warm in Zone 8 or Zone 9, when it really does get cold? How do folks in the desert southwest typically heat? I know there's a lot more dependence on stored radiant heat—this is one of the great advantages of adobe. Wherever you live, is there just a point where normal habits of activity and dress break down, and people just huddle around and survive until the cold breaks? It would make sense in general not to spend too much time building in preparation for an event that might only last a couple nights a year.
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