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Winter is coming

blog.42floors.com

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Re: Winter is coming

#41

Post by padolsey »

robotmay wrote: post #32

I have a somewhat opposite problem; I can't work at all during the summer. I can't deal with heat well and can barely think straight if I get even slightly too warm. This summer in the UK was unbearable in my new flat, which appears to have been designed as the most effective greenhouse in the world. I always look forward to autumn and winter. I get to wear clothes I like, nobody's outside as they're all whinging abo…

I agree. Autumn and Winter in the UK are beautiful and I share that same melancholy bliss. I think my ideal living/working conditions are probably: hot beverage, crackling fire, rain outside, jazz playing in the background.

Re: Winter is coming

#42

Post by mkingston »

Skiing. (Or snowboarding. Or ice climbing. Or mountaineering. For those in milder climates: mountain biking) The take-home point is: get a great winter activity to look forward to.

I used to feel this way (depressed in winter), but not since I started snowboarding. I'm really looking forward to winter at the moment, having moved from the southern to northern hemisphere recently.

Re: Winter is coming

#43

Post by euphemize »

IanDrake wrote: post #25
euphemize wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Will have to agree here. As someone who's working from Canada, this post is semi-funny. I've worked from SF October to January, and let me tell you that biking around town in a t-shirt is not winter.

It's about daylight exposure, not temp. Working indoors is a relatively new phenomenon in humans and effects us all a little differently. When it's dark when you go into work, and you don't have a corner office, and it's dark when you leave your body gets no sunlight. For some, this has a profound effect on mood.

Totally agree (I think temp also plays a role, if your body is working harder to preserve higher temperatures = more tired).

I was only imagining how this blog post would of been about 10x its size if the author lived in Norway or Finland. It's good to keep an eye on these things but luckily for the author, SF is one of the places where the sun hits the most, even in the winter.

Re: Winter is coming

#44

Post by nicholassmith »

fein wrote: post #11

Complaining about the winter in SF? Really? I understand seasonal depression, but that can't even hold a candle to the bullshit we see up here in the Great Salted North. I wake up and bike to work during the winters here... It's pitch black until after 8 AM. After work? Darkness and cold by 5 PM. This is for around 5 months of the year up here. Sure, shit gets annoying during the nastiness of November through March,…

This isn't complaining about the weather though, SAD doesn't care whether the weather is fine for 8 or 9 or 10 months of the year, and it's two middling ones at the end, it'll kick your arse when sunlight is taken away.

Re: Winter is coming

#45

Post by VLM »

WRT "Wake-Up Light With Colored Sunrise Simulation, White" and other technological gadgets, I've a hypothesis that some people actually wake up at sunrise (like an anti-vampire I guess?) and other people do pure internal clock. Furthermore part of my hypothesis is there is a strong correlation between those types and likelihood of SAD-diagnosis.

There are implications beyond SAD, such as alarm clock design. For example I can completely decouple from light input and sleep thru bright sunlight on my face if I'm tired (or drunk or hungover as I occasionally was in my youth). In fact many a time in my youth on weekends I'd come home around sunrise and fall asleep no problemo. If I used an alarm clock that simulated sunrise, I suspect I'd come into work late very often. On the other hand for SAD sufferers is the experience literally like a lightswitch like the sun rises and you are like biologically forced to wake up? If so they'd do very well indeed with a techno-gadget like this.

Re: Winter is coming

#46

Post by venomsnake »

euphemize wrote: post #19
fein wrote: post #11

Complaining about the winter in SF? Really? I understand seasonal depression, but that can't even hold a candle to the bullshit we see up here in the Great Salted North. I wake up and bike to work during the winters here... It's pitch black until after 8 AM. After work? Darkness and cold by 5 PM. This is for around 5 months of the year up here. Sure, shit gets annoying during the nastiness of November through March,…

Will have to agree here. As someone who's working from Canada, this post is semi-funny. I've worked from SF October to January, and let me tell you that biking around town in a t-shirt is not winter.

I have biked and walked in a t-shirt in -17 Celsius. Cold temperature t-shirt tolerance varies a lot with people.

I just really hate wearing jackets in the city and prefer to endure than to wear one.

Re: Winter is coming

#47

Post by VLM »

Pxtl wrote: post #35
IanDrake wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's about daylight exposure, not temp. Working indoors is a relatively new phenomenon in humans and effects us all a little differently. When it's dark when you go into work, and you don't have a corner office, and it's dark when you leave your body gets no sunlight. For some, this has a profound effect on mood.

Remember that the days are even shorter in Canadian winter, too. SF's shortest day of the year is 9.4 hours long. Toronto's shortest day is 8.7 hours long, and Toronto is one of Canada's southern-most cities. Montreal and Quebec City have it worse, but those poor damned Calgarians take the cake with only 7.7 hours of daylight on Christmas. Only about 45 minutes difference from SF here in Hamilton, but still, it's tha…

"completely eclipsed by the 8-hour workday"

Which brings up the mythological tradition that "real programmers" at "real companies" all work 60 to 80 hour death marches all the time, err, at least according to people who (edited to add: think they) make money when their employees go on death marches. Anyway even in summer I think a potential SAD suffer could theoretically spend weeks not seeing sunlight, and that might be an interesting factor in programming death marches. I'm not trying to encourage a new dotcom management fad of "deathmarches are OK as long as you install bright lights by the Foosball table" but it is interesting to contemplate.

Re: Winter is coming

#49

Post by protomyth »

Winter in North Dakota is interesting since you typically go to work and leave work in the dark. When you do go out during the day and drive somewhere, you typically wear sunglasses because the sunshine[1] off the snow makes it hard to drive otherwise. Unless the weather is poor (less often than you think), where you don't see the sun. The wind typically means you are not going to take any leisurely walks.

1) it is fairly sunny, but since the ground is covered in white stuff you don't get the heat absorption. Cloudy days feel less cold.

Re: Winter is coming

#50

Post by mbq »

I live in Poland and I have the opposite; for me winter is a stimulant. I don't know whether this is some remnant genetic call to survive hard times or a fact that it casts a kind of sterile aura that helps me to flow, but I'm objectively more productive then.
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