Weather Fight!
Toughest Weather City Tournament – Midwest Bracket
Duluth vs. Des Moines in round 1. How about we go kick some Des Moinian ass eh?
Duluth
- Brutal cold and snow
- 79.6″ snow
- 45 days of subzero cold
- 2 days of 90+ heat
Des Moines
- Snow/ice, river flood, severe t-storms
- 36″ snow
- 15 days of subzero cold
- 24 days of 90+ heat
OK, I voted for Duluth. But, the thing is, I’d take Duluth over ice storms and, in particular, 90+ heat waves!
Yeah, it’s kind of hard to decide whether this is something we want to win or not. I guess if we’re going to be tough, we might as well be the toughest.
This doesn’t seem like a fair fight — we like our weather, don’t we?
1. You can always put more clothes on; there is only so much my wife will let me take off. Win: Duluth
2. No floods are a definite win: Duluth! Ask my friends in Fargo.
3. There is substantially less snow closer to the lake, in my opinion. So the wise will tell the newcomers from Iowa to Duluth to move up by the mall.
If this is a race to the bottom, I think the floods are far worse than the snow and cold. Far, far worse.
Not gonna lie…while the winter here sucks consistently, if MSP has one of those years where it’s 90+ for two weeks, and then they have -30 for two weeks, they win. I lived there for one of those. *That* was crappy.
Where is Lindquist when we really need him? We need to talk about handicapping and odds, not just weather. That said, I’m going to have to agree with David. In addition to cold, wind and the fact that they live in Fargo, people there have to pile up a million or so sandbags every year just to keep the smelly, brown Red River from flooding their living rooms every year. We’ll take Des Moines easy (once I drove through their in April and I would’ve sworn it was June, people walking around in shorts and t-shirts).
Unless Fargo gets upset by Marquette on the whole snow belt thing, we will never make it past Fargo in the quarter finals, and that is if (and it’s a big if) we make it past International Falls in our next round. I-Falls will be a tough competitor.
My money’s on Fargo all the way here; in fact I think they’ll take the national title.
I agree with Goose. Once iFalls wins things will get tough.
I want nothing to do with the heat. And although I generally don’t take or participate in polls, I voted for Des Moines. I love our weather. All of it.
As for Fargo, its weather sucks unless it blows. In reality it both sucks and blows.
The biggest problem with the weather in Fargo is that it happens in Fargo.
I prefer Dubque, but I’ll take Duluth any day.
Results are in. Des Moines goes down. iFalls is next.
It seems to me the only way we can possibly beat the Falls is if you consider the wretched spring that lasts from March until Grandma’s Marathon. Miserable 43 degree days when it’s balmy everywhere else in the state. We’ve had to have the furnace on in June many years. Winter’s fantastic here, summer’s a joy, and fall is beautiful, but Duluth has the worst spring I’ve ever lived through, year after year.
Seattle: two months of winter and ten months of march.
@ newt: don’t forget the thawing dog poo.
Fargo didn’t have a problem till Grand Forks raised its dikes.
@ zra: I’m guessing International Falls has thawing dog poo, too, though. But maybe it just stays frozen. A scatalogical permafrost. Which, when you think about it, would be a good name for a band.
I just don’t get how people who actually live here (and live inside) could claim winters in Duluth are really rough. For me, winter in North Carolina (38 degrees and raining all the time) was a million times more miserable than a crisp, snowy Duluth winter.
But even if you’re totally cold-phobic, it really isn’t that cold here. Just enough so that we tend to have snow instead of constant nasty slush.
Well, BigE, looks like most folks agree with you–I Falls blew Duluth out of the water, er…ice.
Gotta keep the myth of our tough weather alive, though, to keep out the crush of people who would move here if they know how awesome it really is to having cross country skiing in 5 or 6 months a year.
Gimme the heat,
but not in Des Moines or Dull-uth.
I mean, Des Moines. Srsly? FFS.
Pick a real location.
I pick tropical heat.
FOR LIFE!
DEATH TO SNOW!
INFIDELS!
Coming from the Quad Cities, not too far from Des Moines, I say here is worse.
98 degrees with horrid humidity is NOT enjoyable. You either need to be inside in the air conditioning or in a pool. The only way the river helps at all is if you own a boat, but frankly, who wants to boat in that filthy mud pit? Ick. It’s full of trash, poo and the occasional unfortunate body.
In a remotely related story …
The Consumerist has released brackets for its “Worst Company in America” tournament.
None of the companies are headquartered in Duluth, but several of them have a Duluth presence, like Best Buy, Charter Communications and UnitedHealth Group.
I have to agree with Big E – every time I visit Portland, OR in the winter I freeze my butt off. Doesn’t matter what or how much is worn, cold rain is far worse than dry cold and snow.
Also, after moving here from the Twin Cities, friends and fam would rib me about the weather here. But we moved here to get away from the heat/humidity and have FAR better winters they do.