So This is What Cold Feels Like

This is an actual temperature reading from The Weather Channel on my phone. I've learned that wind chill really makes a difference, even when it's -12 degrees outside.

When I lived in California I always asked people, "What does below 20 feel like?" No matter what they said to me I just didn't really understand. Well now I understand and I'm going to try my best to explain it to you.

Imagine what it feels like when it's late at night and you walk from inside somewhere to your car and the wind cuts through your clothes. When you get inside your car you clench up and shiver a little bit and wait for the car to warm up so you can turn the heater on. Your nose, fingers and thighs are cold. Can you think of a time when you felt that cold? Now think of what the cold air feels like on your face when you open the freezer and how your fingers feel when you reach inside and grab some ice cream.

Cold weather (at least to me from a Ohioan standpoint) kinda feels like a combo of those two sensations. After a certain point, the only difference is how long it takes before your hands go numb. For example, the other day at work it was around 12 degrees. I was outside shoveling a path to our office door when my ear started to feel like something was stabbing it. I thought one of my bobby-pins fell out of my hair and was poking me so I went inside to fix it. My bobby-pins were exactly where I put them that morning. The stabbing feeling was my ear freezing. That happened in about 5-10 minutes. Another day, I took my dog outside at it was around 5 degrees. My fingers went numb in 30 seconds.

The average temperature of a household freezer is 0 degrees or slightly below. (Thanks Google for your access to random statistics). I've experience -34. One thing I've also learned is cold weather is all relative. When living in CA I thought 65 was cold and anything in the 50's was freezing. Now that I live in Ohio in the middle of winter, if the temperature rose to 50 today I would go outside without a sweater on. However, if it was August in Ohio and the temperature all of a sudden dropped to 50 I would wear my winter coat.

I'm not sure if my blood had actually thickened (I could Google it), but to me it seems if you just keep an open mind and go with the flow (and pray your heater works) the cold isn't so bad after all.

But that doesn't mean I'm not looking forward to Spring :)