For those who think 60 degrees is cold...

[NiteOwl]

Maybe *you* are a sissy Yankee? But with heat instead of cold?? It *is* hot here, but that is why god invented sweet tea & air conditioning.

Try moving to just about any place in Ohio, if you don't like sun and moderate weather in your winter. I did a year of gradschool there and nearly died from the weather. 70% of my department was on antidepressants! (or rather 70% would admit to it...) Enjoy the depressing eternally grey skies & the dirty snow. Thank god for the schizophrenic but typically comfortable Alabama weather!

You are dead on about the rednecks and the milk/bread thing though. "Oh my god, the sky is falling....lets go buy bread!!" WTF!!?

I have lived in Alabama all 20 years of my life. Maybe you are right about the yankee thing though, my mom jokes that I was swiched at birth and am actually a northerner because I don't have much of a southern accent and dislike collard greens and some other "country foods".

I like grey skies in the winter. Because typically, if it is sunny, it is going to make it warm outside. I like cold winters. Not necissarily grey skies everyday and I would rather have pretty white snow rather than dirty snow. But if I had the choice of winter being sunny all the time or cloudy all the time, I would choose cloudy.

Sorry, I just love cold weather. You can always add layers and bundle up if is cold, but there is only so much you can take off when its hot.

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[obgyny]

Glad to see I'm not the only one who feels this way! But I'm still curious if you all would choose a school you liked less and/or was lower ranked if the weather was right over a school that you liked more and/or was highly ranked but the weather sucked (either was too cold for us southern folk or too hot for you northerners)? Or would you just suck it up for 4 years?

To answer your question, yes, the weather is a factor for me when it comes to deciding which school to go to (I'm deciding where to go when I transfer to a university, I won't have to decide on a med school for another couple of years). I moved BACK to California because I wanted to go to college in CA, and I hated the weather in Florida. The humidity aggravated my asthma and made me miserable (I'd take cloudy skies over extreme humidity anyday). So I have eliminated FL (and the states surrounding it) from my list of possible schools to go to just because of the weather.

BUT, if I had the choice to pick a top school (med school or university) with horrible weather or a not-so-top school with great weather, I'd probably go to the top school, and continually remind myself it's a top school, despite the weather.

 

[DrRads101]

Somehow I wonder if some of you guys even realize what you will be doing in med school to be so obsessed with what it is like outside... because I can tell you from experience you will be spending almost every waking hour INDOORS whether you are studying, in class, or in the hospital.

Time to suck it up and accept that your life, from now on, is mostly work and 99% of your waking life will be spent indoors.

 

[DrRads101]

I gotta say, anywhere that has more than 3 months of real "winter" was stricken from my application process. Bye bye Chicago. [...]Fog & rain I can handle, but snow I can only do in small doses.

I am confused because you applied to Yale though. You know that New Haven is not only not warmer, but the winters are just as long. To add to that, it also snows a lot more in the Northeast than in Chicago--you don't get "noreasters" there and it is on the west side of Lake Michigan.

New Haven Averages: http://www.weather.com/activities/other/other/weather/climo-monthly-graph.html?locid=USCT0135

Chicago Averages: http://www.weather.com/activities/other/other/weather/climo-monthly-graph.html?locid=USIL0225

 

[unfrozencaveman]

I just dont know. I spent 99% of my time in Miami working, indoors. I think I've been to the beach twice. But, even from indoors, the weather has a huge effect on you. It's not that I complain ad nausem about the weather if it's bad, it's just a huge positive if it's good, whether you're inside or out.
Conversely, my sister who just graduated from CMU in pittsburgh said she couldn't stomach another day because it was so grey all the time. This is coming from someone who grew up in London.

But as for Californians complaining about everything not-Californian? Agh dont get me started. (not you stanford, I love you)

 

[MrBurns10]

Somehow I wonder if some of you guys even realize what you will be doing in med school to be so obsessed with what it is like outside... because I can tell you from experience you will be spending almost every waking hour INDOORS whether you are studying, in class, or in the hospital.

Time to suck it up and accept that your life, from now on, is mostly work and 99% of your waking life will be spent indoors.

Yes, we'll all be studying a lot and a lot of our time will be spent indoors. I just don't think it's a completely irrelevant question. It's not like you're never going to go outside or never going to go out and have fun. Maybe just walking to class I'll be in a better mood if it's warm and sunny out than cold and grey. Considering what an isolating, depressing lifestyle being in med school can be, it seems like the less depressing everything outside is, the better.

 

[DrRads101]

^

I have to disagree. The most unhappiest bunch of students I have ever seen were at UCSD. Some of the happiest I've ever seen is here at Northwestern, which is part of the reason I came here. The city, lifestyle, etc., counts a lot more than weather IMO, and the thing you have to realize is that if you are studying inside in a library and you know you will be there all day, what would you rather have a cozy feeling when you are inside or would you rather feel like you are missing out? It is much, much more depressing studying in the summer here in Chicago than it is in the winter. It is only when I am inside in the summer in the library that I feel like I am really an outcast on society.

But I could see how people may be afraid of weather changes, but there is no education in staying solely within your comfort zone and your region and "what you know." I moved here from North Carolina BTW and I would say I enjoy the weather here equally when looking at the year round big picture.

 

[unfrozencaveman]

I dont think Chicago is the same. It's pretty sunny there, and although it gets freaking cold, it's still at least, uplifting. My parents live on the Northwestern Med campus. Honestly, in terms of location, I really don't think it gets much better at all.

 

[DrRads101]

Maybe it is cloudier in Pitt, I wouldn't know. One thing for sure is that Michigan is extremely cloudy. WAY cloudier than, let's say, Minnesota. The thing is if you are EAST of the Great Lakes, you will get a lot of clouds because the lakes are usually warm and the ground is cold in the winter. This temp differential is just a factory for clouds (warm air clashing with colder air), and since the wind moves from west to the east... well, you guys get the idea...