One day, I took the dogs out for a walk and found icicles! The neighbor had been running the lawn sprinklers so the pipes would not freeze and icicles formed on the hedge. The pic below was taken in January 2010 in the early afternoon on a sunny day. Yup, that means it was still below freezing by early afternoon. I never, ever thought I would see this in Florida and hope to never see it here again.
It was a devastating winter for us - a lot of the native plants were killed along with fruit, ferns, and other commercial crops. Did you know that an area just north of Orlando is like the fern capital? As in the ferns used in floral bouquets. There was a real crisis that year for florists who depended on the local fern growers for Valentine's Day arrangements.
Keeping fingers crossed that this earlier than usual cool weather does not mean another winter like that one.
I can remember sitting in the hotel looking at the beach and thinking I was glad I packed a jacket. It's a different cold than in New England, I kept calling myself a whimp for being cold but it just soaks into you and it's hard to warm back up. I'm sure the humidity doesn't help.
ReplyDeleteSee what you can do to keep it warm for this Feburary :) hopefully I'll make it back down
J
I could hug you for saying it was a different kind of cold! It is a damp cold - there is almost always relatively high humidity here. My house is cinder block and built to not let the direct sun into the house so once it gets cold, the house stays cold.
DeleteI bought my first electric blanket after moving to FL and love it....it's the only way to stay warm and keep the electric bill down.
I'll see what I can do for February. Let me know if you make it down here so we can at least meet in person!
So far it looks promising, but I thought that last year and a few friends had to back out so we all decided to pass.
DeleteI'll let you know ;)
J