I've officially been the coldest that I've ever been

[thewayne]

Three weeks ago, we had a pretty good storm hit. I had to go to Las Cruces on Friday, and as I passed the wood train trestle just down from Cloudcroft the thermometer in my car said it was 3 degrees F outside.

I thought that was pretty darn cold, and I was smart enough not to get out of my car there.

Tonight I was doing Apollo spotting at the observatory.

It was 15 degrees F.

The wind was gusting at 20 MPH.

The wind chill factor made it an effective -2 F.

Definitely gotta get better gloves and boots.

Comments

[vaudy.livejournal.com]

Pshaw! A few weeks ago I had to get up at 3am and go out in the -30F windchill to start my car, so the engine wouldn't get too cold overnight to start in the morning. (I learned my lesson with this car last year.)

Merry Christmas!

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

What you need to know is that up until 5 years ago I lived in Phoenix, and I can still handle 115 degree summers.

Uphill! Both ways!


Merry Christmas to you too, girl!

[vdansk]

OK, you're from the south, and I'm from the north, so this is purely bragging--but when I was in med school I once changed to headlight on my car (outside) on a day where the high temperature was 20 below. I had a day off, if was January, and there was no reason to suppose that my next day off would be any warmer. (Now, had i only REALIZED that you can PAY someone to change your headlight...!)

Charles defines cold as the temperature at which your nostril hairs freeze in the erect position when you step outside and take that first breath. By our studies, that's about 10 below F. :) The only time outdoor recess was cancelled for cold when I was a kid, it was 40 below 0--at which point, it doesn't matter if you use Farenheit or Celcius. Vermonters are tough...Here in Massachusetts, they'd cancel school altogether for that!

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

I don't know if you've heard from Russ re: her Xmas swag, but I got her Grammar Girl's book, and also the Gurps Vorkosigan! She was quite happy with both, and was considering writing a Miles story for the Yuletide exchange. I was seriously tempted to give it to her early had she committed to it.

[vdansk]

Very cool! I'll have to order the Vorosigan book for Charle's birthday!

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

Back before I got a Real Job, I was on a crew doing a kind of survey work in the woods. We were under orders to work half of a Saturday on a day that turned out to be 30 below zero f. But the trucks wouldn't start, so we went back to bed. Incidentally, by that afternoon (which we'd arranged to have off; mighty white of the boss to let us have half a day off per week) the temperature had risen to 40 above. Biggest temperature swing I've ever experienced in one day.

We did work out all day a couple of times when the temperature was -10. It's actually pretty nice; it never gets that cold around here except on brilliantly sunny days, and the sun is warming. Plus such days are calm. No problem lighting a lunch fire to warm up at noon. All in all, it was much more pleasant than working at 20 or even 30 degrees on a damp, cloudy day. We all got horrible sunburns, though.

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

oh, yeah, by the way, I'm talking dry-bulb temperature, none of this wind chill or heat index mumbo-jumbo. That's just ridiculous. "It's 40 out but with the wind it feels like it's thirty below below zero." Bullpuckey. 40 degrees with a wind feels like 40 degrees. 30 below feels like 30 below. Wind and wet affect how fast your coat soaks and starts to sap your body heat and kill you, but that's another matter, and fairly easily countered, assuming you have the jack to get good outdoor clothing.