Hey coco!
where in ontario are you? I am in Burlington - agree summers are wonderful but so short - having to endure the long winters and is starting to get to me - i love fall and spring but they seem short and not the same as when i was growing up weather-wise...
i hear belize calling me

la_veronique Wrote:
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> hi banana who
>
> concerning chicago land
>
> i was given some pretty explicit details
> concerning the winters
> i was told that it was the coldest place on planet
> earth
> it made me want to PERMANETLY avoid chicago
> for the rest of my life ( or at least... during
> the winters
>
>
> is it true that it can get 60 below ?
> i find that hard to believe
> wouldn't your eyeballs
> and organs
>
> just .... go craaazy or SOMEthing?
>
> seems so unnatural
>
> either chicagoans REALLY love their city
>
> or they have some MIGHTTTTEEE persevering
> constitutions to handle the frost

About your last point, I am constantly amazed that lifelong Chicago residents never get used to the cold! I also have noticed lately that we talk about the weather quite a bit because it's so mercurial. For instance, we have had an early warmup in April--70s and 80s, but this last week it's been more seasonal and even a frost warning last night! I was surprised a few months ago to read an article in the local paper where they were asking tourists downtown how they felt about the cold and this woman from Sweden said it was really cold! Does that seem possible? But no, it doesn't get that cold and I cannot understand why Canadians don't seem to be as freaked out by the cold when it's got to be colder up there, right? The thing about Chicago is that it is extreme. In July, it can get up in the 90s with an unbearable humidity. We happen to live in a glorified swampland, I think. Last summer I was downtown and it looked very ominous: black clouds and swirling winds. I hopped on a bus and as we were driving off, there was a break in the clouds, some rays of sun and it started raining! It also had gotten much cooler. I heard some tourists saying how bizarre the weather was!

Banana ~ Alaska. It's north north, so north they have 24 day and night, right? But people still love it. I don't get it either. Winters in Toronto nearly did me in, they are so bitterly cold and ferociously windy.

SweetP, I am south of Windsor on the lake. What's Burlington like? I only ever stop to take the GO train into TO from there.

banana who Wrote:
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> Along with access to a variety of fresh produce
> would be the ideal climate for a year-round
> growing season (or close to that). And not a
> swampy, moscito-ridden, unbearly humid climate,
> nor too arid. I will bet that California is #1,
> but others? And in the Midwest, where are the best
> locales? I live outside Chicago and we get varied,
> decent produce, although the growing season is
> fairly short.
>
> And I have always wondered this: why are
> greenhouses inferior to out in the sun, if the
> veggies still get the energy of the sun through
> the glass? Hmm? (*Edit: I should add that I ask
> this question because if I chose to stay in the
> Midwest, perhaps a greenhouse would be a
> reasonable compromise?)

Pacific Northwest. Mildest region in the country, warm winters, cool summers. Rains and clouds for sun being the tradeoff. But at Northern California and you have some wonderful small towns, Ukiah, CA; Corvallis, OR; Eugene, OR; Astoria, OR (ever see Kindergarten Cop?); Olympia WA, Bellingham WA.

I lived in Chicago for 26yrs. I think a lot of people stay there out of laziness, accepting the mediocre, and fear. Dozens of my friends/acquaintences "moved away" and had big goodbye parties for themselves only to not have been able to hack it anywhere else and came crawling back within a year. I'm glad I got exhausted by drab unhealthiness, flat geography, horrible politics and attitudes and was able to move on. I'll always love the midwest, but kind of like a no-good boyfriend that I should have never gone out with in the first place.

stellium Wrote:
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> I lived in Chicago for 26yrs. I think a lot of
> people stay there out of laziness, accepting the
> mediocre, and fear. Dozens of my
> friends/acquaintences "moved away" and had big
> goodbye parties for themselves only to not have
> been able to hack it anywhere else and came
> crawling back within a year. I'm glad I got
> exhausted by drab unhealthiness, flat geography,
> horrible politics and attitudes and was able to
> move on. I'll always love the midwest, but kind of
> like a no-good boyfriend that I should have never
> gone out with in the first place.

But you were not born here, were you? Actually, I grew up in a very progressive place and although I never moved away, many of my classmates did and came back after college because it's a great place to raise a family. I don't know exactly where you were living but I have to defend this area! It's nice and yes, the flat land is a tradeoff but I had a girlfriend who lived in N. CA for years and moved back because of the "spacy" people!