2023, animals, home, Nature, Uncategorized, Weather

Brrr!

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Last Saturday we reached a milestone in our community of a record breaking windchill of -70° F. I can’t say I was glad to be a part of this. The cold interfered with a lot of things. The guy who is putting new carpet in our basement had to beg off from coming over as his diesel vehicle was completely frozen up and he couldn’t haul the things that he needed. We didn’t leave the house from Friday afternoon until Monday morning. We kept the curtains and blinds closed to keep the heat in and the cold out. I can’t imagine how hard it was for ranchers to keep their cattle safe out in the pastures.

The dog has suffered the most with the cold. He finally got a walk yesterday. Last Friday he went in the yard and got so cold that he couldn’t move and Husband had to rescue him. That was after only a minute or so outside. He wouldn’t be cooperative with booties, and the enforced inside stay has made him constantly begging for attention and doing zoomies around the house since it was too cold to go for walks.

Daughter tried to explain to her West Coast friends how cold it was here, but they just couldn’t relate. It is hard to explain that the cold interferes with the pressure in vehicle tires, and how hard it is to put air in tires when exposed skin will freeze in less than a few minutes. Warmer weather is predicted for next week. I think the dog will be relieved he can finally go for walks.

How do you cope with extreme cold? Any experiences with frost bite?

40 thoughts on “Brrr!”

    1. I have a big honkin’ white coat that is two or three sizes too big for me. It’s my below 10° coat and I can put several layers underneath it. It’s faux fur so it gets a lot of attention when I wear it out and about. That being said, the very very cold weather the last 2-3 days, I just haven’t gone out — coat or no coat.

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      1. The thing is, this isn’t very very cold. It’s just cold. I can remember walking the dog when it was 20 below by the thermometer—that’s aside from windchill. 20 below is when you need to get out the special gear.

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  2. Leggings under sweatpants, an extra layer under a nice warm hooded down coat, which I realize I should get out now.

    I can’t imagine that -70 degree stuff. Here in what is sometimes called the Miami of Minnesota, overnight temps have gotten below -20, and I don’t envy the people with dogs. My cat used to take one whiff when I opened the door and abruptly turn around, saying “What, are you nuts?”

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      1. I saw that yesterday and it could be our house. Guinevere is not even remotely interested in going out in this and has to be basically shoved out to do her business.

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  3. Cold like this makes me tired, sore, and stupid. My Icelandic sweater has been getting a lot of wear. Some coworkers got their hair wet and went outside and flipped their locks so that the hair froze straight up from their heads.

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  7. There’s a saying I’ve heard a few times: There’s no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing choices. Or a similar sentiment. Translation–if you dress properly, even -70 windchills shouldn’t be dangerous. Of course, the people who say that are outdoor enthusiasts who spend whatever they need to spend and get the best, most appropriate gear for serious winter activities.

    That said, I don’t tolerate cold well—mainly fingers and toes numb up pretty fast. I also have Reynaud’s syndrome (Condition, phenomenon, disease, whatever they’re calling it this week.) Reynaud’s is a sudden constricting of blood vessels in one’s extremities, turning the digits white because the blood retreats into the body. If ignored, it causes frostbite, which happened to me the first time I got it.

    Manifested as a red rash with some swelling on one hand. It didn’t go away, so I went to the doc. Instant diagnosis—frostbite! Imagine my surprise since I didn’t recall being outdoors in cold weather more than normal and I certainly never felt like I could even get frostbite. He prescribed some cream and low-dose blood pressure meds to open the capillaries. I still get the white fingertips now and then, but i can recognize and either warm up my hands or increase the blood flow with exercise or literally shaking the blood into my fingers by rapidly swinging my arms back and forth.

    I love playing outdoors in winter—skiing, snowshoeing, and skating, but can rarely stay out for more than one hour before I have to worry about frostbite. Bummer.

    Chris in Owatonna (still going up to the North Shore next month for a ski/snowshoe vacay!)

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      3. Please be careful about burns if he has lost sensation in his feet. Unfortunately people have been burned because they have lost sensation for one reason or another. I don’t know how hot those things get so maybe it isn’t a problem.

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      5. I agree with Chris, those chemical hand-warmer packets are wonderful in mittens. I have tried putting them inside my slippers when my feet get cold, and they’re too hot. I’m amazed at how long they stay warm.

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  8. Mostly I stay inside with the window shades pulled to keep the cold drafts to a minimum. I have lots of cold weather clothing and accessories if I do need to be outside. Chemical hand and foot warmers come in handy for extreme cold. As an adult I have not experienced frostbite. As a kid, my friends and I would go to the local outdoor skating rink no matter what the weather. There was a warming house with a stove but it put out very little heat. After a couple hours of skating, my feet would be like little blocks of ice – painful to get the skates off. Maybe that’s why my feet get cold easily now. I think about the winter clothing we wore growing up (fiberfill jackets, short unlined boots, etc) and wonder how we ever managed to stay warm. One fad from high school was for girls to wear wool Bermuda shorts with knee highs during the winter. How stupid was that?!?!?

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  9. For all the time I spent working outside in very cold weather, I never got frostbite, except on my cheeks perhaps, and then not very serious. I learned to dress in layers. We went into the woods in very cold weather but when the wind got very strong with the cold we did not. But we had to do the barn chores, and colder weather meant more wood brought to the house. We often worked in the workshop which had a huge barrel stove in it, the homemade kind. I remember a few true blizzard by the old definition when you worried you might get lost in the yard, but you might get off track but you would bump into something. In the end the fall of the hill would tell you. I liked being in the barn o very cold days.
    Clyde

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  10. Trying to log in…

    I think I have experienced windchill temps down to around -55F. I remember air temps of -25 with a wind. The colder the air temp, the less wind it takes to drop the “feels like” temp even further.

    I wear leggings under sweats or a pair of overalls I have. I have a big down parka with a hood. I’ve worn extra layers under that. I’ve wrapped my neck and face in scarves and shoved a hat on, then put the hood up. Pippin wears a sweater and a coat over that. He refuses to wear booties. We don’t have a fenced yard and he’s trained to go for a leash walk with me so we HAVE to go out. We do this quickly. He seems to understand that he needs to get the job done and he does it promptly. I tell him it’s cold outside, he feels it and does what he needs to do. I bare one hand, scoop up his droppings in a baggie, and we run for home. Then we both need more fresh air and exercise. I close up the house too, keep the blinds closed and curtains drawn. I turn on the ceiling fans upstairs to keep heat on the main level (I don’t know if this works or not).

    I have spent the past 10-12 years hot all the time. I think my hormones have finally stabilized. This is the first year I’ve needed to set my thermostat higher. I have always set it around 62 or 63. Now it’s up to 65 and last night I was really cold for some reason, so I boosted it up to 68! I turned it down before bed and I’m not cold so far today.

    I like all the seasons. They’re why we live here.

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  14. About 30 years ago, I was parked in the Greyhound bus station parking lot downtown, waiting for a friend who is coming in from Madison (I believe). It was February, and it was extremely cold that day, and I remember, even though the car was running, watching the temperature go down on the thermostat.

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  15. Forgot to mention that I walked several miles one night when the temp was around 0. It was almost 50 years ago when it was pretty safe for a young woman to walk all the way across Faribault, from the southeast to the northwest. I felt warm enough. I never wore a hat back then. I thought I was too cool for hats. I didn’t realize it until I got home and eventually began to feel the tops of my ears stinging, then itching. Turns out my ears were frost bitten.

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    1. When you get that basement of yours re-carpeted and fully functional, I suggest you and Chris open an Air B&B. People could come visit, take care of that pesky terrier of yours while you’re off at work, and enjoy learning about all of the wonderful meals you cook for each other. Some visitor could even be pressed into service if interested.

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  18. When it’s very cold, the polar vortex days when it never gets above zero, I worry about the water pipes in my laundry room. They run through an unheated crawl space for a couple of feet or so. My cold weather activity is doing laundry to keep the water moving through those pipes. Sometimes I leave a slow drip going overnight just to be sure.

    I froze the tips of my ears once when I was a teenager. The skin peeled like a sunburn over the next few days.

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