In my interactions with people who live in different parts of the United States, including people from my wife’s side of the family who live in warmer climates, I’m often struck by their visceral reaction at the mention of parts of our world that experience cold temperatures. They shiver when a name such as “Minnesota” is mentioned and say “Cold!” or something like that. Think of the reaction you have when you hear the names “Siberia” “Alaska,” or “Antarctica.” The reaction is milder for a place such as Minnesota, but it is there nonetheless.

Now, I’ve been thinking about the importance of this reaction here in the U.S., where a growing share of the population lives in warmer climates. Demographic shifts have moved the center of the U.S. population in a southwesterly shift for decades now, and it seems unlikely there will be northward shift any time soon (although climate change may affect that). All those people are accustomed to a warm climate and unfamiliar with a cold one. In fact, I would say they have a certain amount of what I call “cold intolerance.”

“Cold intolerance” is a medical term used for a symptom of some illnesses. It’s a severe bodily reaction to cold temperatures. However, I’m using the term here in a cultural sense to describe people’s negative attitude toward cold-climate places.

People who are cold intolerant will not be likely to visit a cold place–certainly not in the winter–nor will they likely want to move there to take a job or attend school. Nor will they be likely to move a company’s headquarters there, nor would they hold a convention there unless it is during a warm time of the year.

I think you see where I’m going with this: in a country (and world?) in which economic and political power is increasingly located in warmer climates, cold-climate regions will likely suffer from more and more cold intolerance, from decisions that are impacted by a lack of experience with living in a cold climate.

I’ve thought about this with regard to the recent merger of Northwest Airlines with Delta Airlines. The former was headquartered in Minneapolis, the latter in Atlanta. There was little discussion of locating the new headquarters in Minneapolis; it seemed to be largely assumed that it would be in Atlanta. To be sure, Delta is larger than Northwest and Atlanta is larger than Minneapolis-St. Paul, but neither are tremendously larger. High-paying jobs will be lost in Minneapolis-St. Paul and gained in Atlanta.

How is this cold intolerance affecting the Snowbelt? I’m open to your insights, particularly if you have facts and figures to back them up.

One further conclusion: I feel that cold intolerance means that northern areas will be more reliant on nurturing their own talent from within, because they will be less likely to import it from outside. Thus strong public education systems and strong government will be needed there. I realize there is currently a lot of migration from impoverished areas of the world to cold-climate regions, so my thesis is less accurate on a global scale than it is on a national scale.

We’ve gotten even lower than yesterday morning: minus 29 degrees (F). This time it’s confirmed by the same temp at Stanton Airfield.

Stayed inside yesterday, but must go out today. This is one of those times I appreciate my car.

Our thermometer read minus 28F this morning. I looked at it for a while to make sure I was reading it right. Nearby Stanton Airfield reports that it was 24 below. Northfield Public Schools are closed today.

These are the coldest temperatures I’ve experienced since moving back to Minnesota in 2004. The coldest temperature I remember from Minnesota winters before that is minus 35 at my parents’ house in suburban Minneapolis.

It was about minus 5 yesterday afternoon here in Northfield. I’m not particularly hardy in the cold, and I have to bundle up. So  when driving my daughter to and from preschool I wore three layers on my legs – two layers of long underwear underneath flannel-lined khakis – and four layers on top, including a fleece jacket underneath a down coat. I also had on two pairs of Smartwool socks inside insulated boots. On my hands I wore thin gloves that I wear underneath mittens. The gloves allow me to do fine work such as buckling children into car seats and fishing keys out of pockets.

While downtown I ran into a friend and fellow member of our local Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation, Dan Kust, who was getting off his bike. He bikes to his job as a teacher at Northfield Middle School and is a mountaineer and outdoorsman. “You’re amazing, Dan,” I said. I asked him how it was out there. “Brutal,” he said, noting the toll the cold takes on the hands and feet.

Next week we will warm up, with highs above freezing – 60 degrees warmer than this morning!

It’s minus 23 F right now according to my thermometer and the Stanton Airfield weather station. Their three-day summary shows that the temp has been dropping steadily and may fall even lower. Wind chill is minus 37 F!

I recently finished reading Dante’s Inferno for the first time. Normally I read the Bible for my brief devotional time in the morning, but this time I decided a change was in order. I resolved to read Dante’s classic epic poem.

I don’t have time to comment fully on the poem and Robert Pinsky’s translation, but I will note two things. First, besides being an inquiry into hell and the sins that create it, the poem is a remarkable look at Dante’s time and place – medieval Italy. The politics and history of Italian city states is fascinating as well as frightening. With endless warring, intrigues, scheming, and treachery, their history is not for the squeamish. It makes me wonder if that isn’t the normal way of the world, while the settled peace I’m accustomed to during my lifetime here in the United States is the exception.

Secondly, down at the heart of hell, the temperature is not hot. Instead it’s very cold, and the tormented souls are encased in ice.

Most people would seem to agree that the cold is a kind of hell on earth, though I try not to be one of them. Something to think about during this cold Upper Midwestern winter.

I took the photo above during a recent cross-country ski outing that took me around the periphery of St. Olaf College on New Year’s Day. As I was taking photos of Regents Hall, St. Olaf’s impressive new science center,  I realized that the sky was fabulous that day.

I like the sky’s deep blueness in the center of the photo and its wispy clouds. The sky here says something to me about possibilities, about the wonders that exist near us and to which we are normally oblivious.

I’m glad I was able to get out on my skis, get some exercise, appreciate the natural scenery near our home, and take some photos. I’m thankful that I was able to start out the new year in this way.

See another photo of Regents Hall below.

Back in the end of January I wrote about problems I was having with my hands and feet in cold weather. As time went on, I noticed that the end of my nose and the tops of my ears were also affected. I found the latter odd, since I rarely have my head uncovered outside in the winter.

When going outside in cold weather, I noticed that I’d quickly feel cold, even slightly tingly, in the mentioned extremities, despite dressing very warmly. When going back inside, those areas would become red as they warmed up and I’d feel a stronger tingling sensation.

As time has gone on, these symptoms have lessened, probably because of time and the end of winter.

When I saw the doctor about this in January, he thought I might have chilblains, which can sometimes involve a systemic problem with the blood thickening upon exposure to the cold. On the other hand, a friend said that I might have gotten “frosted,” which made me think that I may have experienced “frostnip,” the mildest form of frostbite.

I still don’t know the cause of these problems and can’t point to one incident that caused them. It may have been due to playing outside with my daughter in cold weather, sometimes around 10-15 degrees with wind, I think, though I was dressed very warmly. Or my troubles may have been the result of riding my bike in the winter, though I did that much less than usual this year and not in the coldest weather. Read the rest of this entry »

Much of the Upper Midwest received a late-winter wallop of snow yesterday, with as much as 8 inches falling in parts of the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. Can you see the birds in the photo above? Can’t they plow the bird feeders around here?

As someone said on the radio yesterday, if this had happened one day later – on the first day of April rather than the last day of March – I’d have been less accepting of this snowfall. As it is, the sun will dispatch this stuff soon, and we can move on to the next season. At least we hope we can.

Below is the scene in our courtyard, as seen through patio doors.

Thank goodness the Upper Midwest has meteorologist Paul Douglas helping to draw attention to the threat from global warming. These words from Mr. Douglas’s StarTribune weather column today really caught my attention:

“Paul, you pinhead, doesn’t our recent arctic streak prove that global warming is a hoax?” With all due respect, no. From -11 last Wednesday to 44 yesterday in St. Paul, 48 in Red Wing, these local, erratic weather spasms are not the same thing as long-term climate trends measured globally over the last generation. Worldwide 2007 was the 5th warmest, last year the 10th warmest for the U.S. since 1895. So what? “Climate change over the next 20 years could result in a global catastrophe costing millions of lives in wars and natural disasters – disruption and conflict will be endemic features of life – the threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism.” More left-leaning spew from the liberal elite? No. Those are but a few of the conclusions from a secret Pentagon report, recently obtained by the U.K. newspaper, The Observer. “Climate change should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a U.S. national security concern,” says the lead authors. I don’t consider myself an alarmist or a so-called “warmist”. I am a realist. No, science is never 100% certain about anything, but what is the more acceptable risk, taking some action now and being wrong, or doing nothing, rolling the dice, gambling that a 37% spike in greenhouse gases will have no effect? It’s basic risk analysis.

Wow. I agree with what Mr. Douglas has said here, but I think the report he is citing is not all that recent. The Observer article he cites is dated February 22, 2004. I guess “recent” is a rather loose term.

Still, Paul, thanks for bringing this up. I’m hearing more about “global climate chaos” lately, so the 2004 (or earlier) report is still relevant.

Let’s elevate global warming to a national security concern and deal with it. Those of you concerned about national security, please read the peer-reviewed science (or the work of a journalist who has read it) and get on board this train. It also has room for those of you who want to make and save some money from clean energy and energy efficiency.

I’ve heard this winter in the Upper Midwest described as “your father’s winter” – meaning it’s like a winter in days of yore. Or perhaps, to be gender-neutral, we should say this winter is “your parents’ winter.”

We’ve had a handful of days here in southern Minnesota, including this morning, that have begun with temperatures around 16 below zero – thankfully no colder than that. That’s cold enough. Currently we’re reaching the nadir of a cold spell that is supposed to moderate in a couple of days.

Making things worse, I’m having some circulation problems in my hands and feet – a numb tingling that follows exposure to cold. Is it the result of some allergy medication that I’m taking? Some of the medical literature leads me to think that, and I will see a doctor today. Is it Raynaud’s disease, a condition my father has had, in which the body has an exaggerated response to cold temperatures? Is it the result of biking in twenty-degree temperatures? Is it because I haven’t been exercising enough? Or am I just getting old? Time will tell, and I can only hope that I’ll be able to resume a reasonably active life outdoors in winter.