Today through Friday we are supposed to have lots of negative temperatures and that reminded me of a few cold weather stories.
The first was years ago when I lived in the Florida Keys and worked on a charter fishing boat doing night fishing trips. The boat was in Islamorada and was a party fishing boat that could take out as many as 60 people. The typical trip was around 10-20 people.
The winter that mated on the boat was unseasonably cold. It would get into the high 40s some nights. Being on the water and getting hands wet often, this was very cold. I would heat my hands over the engine by raising the engine cover. Some nights it was like a campfire as we all huddled over the engine heat.
The funny part was that the locals were not used to temperatures below 60s and they didn’t have the winter gear and coats. You would see coats come out of the attic from the 70’s and earlier. The shorts and bikini clad towns would turn into a bad 70’s and 80’s party. It was great, and I wish that I would have photographed a bunch of people to write a book about it. I think that people would enjoy seeing the garb from decades ago…And, you all wondered where your old winter coats ended up.:-)
The next story was a month ago when I was speaking with a grandfather of a bride from Florida. He was laughing at how the locals get all bent out of shape with cold weather. He said that the news was all up in arms telling people to “bundle up your children today” because the weather was predicted to dip below 70, yes 70! I remember in college, in Green Bay, WI, when guys would be out in a t-shirt and shorts in 40 degree weather, after a long winter.
Just the other day my neighbor was riding his snowmobile around the block in a t-shirt and shorts??? Not sure what that was about.
One last story, when I was at St. Norbert College the President of the College called off school one day because the wind chill was below -50 degrees. It was so cold that your face would go numb when exposed to the air. Anyways, everyone went out and partied since there wasn’t school and the President vowed never to have another day off of school for weather. So to all of your Norbert students – Sorry!:-)
Those are my cold stories, I have a ton more. That is what happens when you live your life in the cold climate.
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