Cold-d-d-d W-w-w-weather! Br-r-r-!

[DALederle]

I having a bad case of SAD (seasonal effective disorder) today. I get it every year about this time and can't wait for the Super Bowl to get over and the baseball season to start.
One of my biggest problems is with all the clothes I have to wear to stay warm and avoid catching colds. I'm retired right now, because of my poor health. Emphysema and congestive heart failure which makes it actually dangerous for me to go outside during the winter. I cannot shovel snow or even walk behind the snow blower. Nor can I mow the lawn anymore in the summer.
But worst of all for me is I find it hard to wear a skirt this time of the year.
I'm usually bare legged when wearing a skirt or a kilt, or in at best knee socks. But that doesn't help keep me warm. I shiver and shake from November until April and don't really want to go out anywhere or try and do anything.
I know it just me, for the most part but doesn't anyone else have trouble wearing a skirt or kilt in the cold weather.
I see pictures all the time of kilt wearing marching bands parading down city streets in the cold weather and it makes me want to shiver as I look at them. How do they keep warm.
Below 70 deg. F I shiver and shake. Even inside the house, with the thermostat set at 72 I'm cold.
What do skirted men do during the winter.
Are you all wear panthose or tights?
Do you have some magic cream to rub on your legs?
Please believe me that I'm not asking as a joke. I'd like to know how other skirted or kilted(I own both) men handle cold weather.
Dennis

I

[cessna152towser]

Heavyweight wool kilts for me, the hemline of which just touches the top of kneesocks, that way I stay warm.

[sapphire]

I'm not a man, but thought I'd share.

A heavy skirt and tights are a good place to start. I've been known to wear tights, knee socks and ankle socks and boots. I know I look like Granny Klampett. A warm slip also helps.

Two tips, keep your feet warm with socks, layered if you have to and make sure your shoes or boots are not tight and allow good air flow. Keep your feet dry.

Wear a hat. You'll be surprised.

[AMM]

For me, it's knee socks, ankle-length skirts with multiple (long) petticoats, a sweater, and a heavy L.L. Bean hooded parka with a wool cap.

However, one other thing is that if you're doing some exertion -- walking a half-mile is enough -- you don't need as many layers as you might think. If I've just gotten out of bed and am going to the post office (1/2 mile from my apartment), and have enough layers to be warm when I walk out the door, I'm sweating before I'm halfway there.

Unfortunately, I suspect that emphysema and heart disease limit your ability to do even that much exertion.

How far are you able to walk when you go out in "good" weather?

[DALederle]

I can only walk about 100 feet or so, comfortably. After that it is a strain.
I do try and ride my excercize bike every day, about a mile a day, for about ten minutes.
But I do that VERY slowly so has to have low impact.
I also work out with free weights, 5 and 10 lb. dumbells every other day.
I try to get as much excercize as I can.
Going out in the cold is pretty much only on a "needed" basis.
The one thing I really worry about now, over being outside in a skirt, is that if something were to happen to me.
I know that's silly but with my health something going wrong isn't that far fetched.
I know that the MDs and RNs and paramedics have seen it all so a man in a skirt shouldn't bother them. But it would relly bother my wife if she had to go to the mergency room (which she has had to do over the last few years) only to find I was skirted at the time. Fortunatly it's only happened at work, so I was always dressed in my work pants at those times.
I guess my fear is for her not me.
Though I am paranoid!
Clinically diagnosed as paranoid.
Dennis

[crfriend]

I am typically very cold-averse, but depending on how hard I'm exerting myself, I find I can get away with surprisingly little in the way of "heavy" clothing.

I've been out shovelling snow, for instance, in tights, my usual loafers, a long skirt, a slip (useful for both warmth and skirt "management"), shirt, a windbreaker, hat, and gloves. I think the key for me is the hat and gloves, and especially keeping dry -- once I get wet, it's "game over", and "wet" can be from perspiration as well as "external" sources (layers!). Now, the above rig is most assuredly not enough to keep me warm if I'm idling; however, as I dislike winter weather fairly intensely, if I'm out in it, I'm working. Hard, so I can get inside quicker.

[Bob]

Uhh... I just don't wear skirts as much in the winter. Because it's cold out, and most of my skirts are knee length or above. In the coldest times, I wear will tights under pants because that is warmer than just pants.

[JRMILLER]

Guys,
My house is older and it tends to be cold when it's really cold outside, so this limits my skirt wearing even in the house! I do, however, have a pair of fuzzy blue pajama bottoms that work quite nicely in the winter. Did I say blue? Yes, they are a nice manly blue!

[Departed Member]

I having a bad case of SAD (seasonal effective disorder) today.

I can really emphasise with you here! Lack of sunlight pushes me well down "Depression Road".

I know it just me, for the most part but doesn't anyone else have trouble wearing a skirt or kilt in the cold weather.

Cold weather? We are perhaps fortunate in the UK, as we rarely suffer from excessively cold weather (says he, as a Siberian chill is about to descend on the UK, this weekend!). The temperature here is currently around the 35-37F mark - time to swop from skirts to KIlts (although denim skirts are extremely versatile, temperature-wise!). For me, Kilts are generally too warm to wear if the temp. soars above the 45-47F mark. However, the current 30-35F is, to say the least, ideal for Kilt & kneesocks! Below 32F, then a suitable slip is probably worth adding, if you're thinking about standing around anywhere, too long! And if there's a 'windchill' factor involved, then even 'thigh-highs' may help maintain a healthy balance. In any of these circumstances, Kilt+thick socks is warmer, healthier & more comfortable than the dreaded tr*user option. However, below, say 25F, even that may be open to question.....................!

[crfriend]

I having a bad case of SAD (seasonal effective disorder) today.

I can really emphasise with you here! Lack of sunlight pushes me well down "Depression Road".

I suspect that malady is vastly more common than is generally accepted. In fact the entire diagnosis of "Seasonal Affective Disorder" is quite recent. The good thing about it (if there is anything good) is that higher light levels do help. I've found in the past few winters that doubling up on the light level in my office, along with adjusting my hours so I get sunlight in the afternoon (at the expense of getting up at 04:30), has helped me greatly with the affliction. Too, if one can do it, "getting away" to lower latitudes for a few weeks in mid-winter can be a tremendous help!

Cold weather? We are perhaps fortunate in the UK, as we rarely suffer from excessively cold weather (says he, as a Siberian chill is about to descend on the UK, this weekend!).

The temperatures in central Massachusetts haven't cracked the freezing degree mark for more than a moment in three weeks, and night-time temperatures have averaged in the teens. Of course that's nothing compared to what our Canadian neighbours to the north go through, but that nastiest thing about it here is that we tend to get wet cold -- and that's really unpleasant stuff.

However, below, say 25F, even that [kilt+thick socks option] may be open to question.....................!

It all depends on what one is going to be doing. If one is going to be active, then it's possible to stay warm in such temperatures -- providing one can also stay dry. If one is going to be sedentary, on the other hand, it's best to stay indoors!

[Since1982]

Sapphire said: A heavy skirt and tights are a good place to start. I've been known to wear tights, knee socks and ankle socks and boots. I know I look like Granny Klampett. A warm slip also helps.

Agree with Sapphire here. In cold weather I wear pretty much the same rig Sapphire just described. Mid calf to ankle length skirt, one or two thick nylon slips, extra heavy ribbed tights, double socks over the tights, thick boots, and a Nothern style furry interior ear covering hat (don't know the correct name for this head cover). Chapstick for my dry nose and lips, cold weather in the keys drives the humidity right out the other side of the islands. I have armpit length hair and I suppose if I pulled it back into a ponytail I "could" resemble a 6'1" Granny Clampett...or Klampett..It's been so long since I've seen a Beverly Hillbillies show I don't really remember how they spelled their name. (or care). hehehe

[sapphire]

Skip,
I think you got the spelling of Granny Clampett right

If we could get photo'd together in our Granny Clampetts, wouldn't that be hysterical?

Since one tends to lose most of one's body heat from the head, a hat is essential, as are ear coverings.

If you've got your middle bundled up appropriately, a hat and warm, dry feet will help keep the chills away.

[Since1982]

Sapphire said: If we could get photo'd together in our Granny Clampetts, wouldn't that be hysterical?

Would be without a doubt! I wish you didn't live so far away.

[crfriend]

Well, it got all the way up to 38 degrees (F) today, and that was enough to get ice-dam on the northeast corner of our roof to start playing up. For those lucky enough to be living in semi-tropical climes, these blasted things happen when the insulating effect of fallen snow on roofs causes an air-pocket to form, the snow to melt, and then re-freeze into ice (the heat is supplied by the house's heating system). The ice then blocks any potential runoff of melt-water so it backs up under the shingles and leaks into the house. Once one forms, the only way to deal with it is to get up on a ladder and hack the ice away manually. That's what I had to do this afternoon after noticing droplets of water on the interior window-frame of our northeast window.

Guess what I wore to deal with this "inconvenience". Yup -- trousers. And a good thing, too, because by the time I got done I was soaking wet from stem to stern and a goodly bit chilled to boot. I imagine I'll have things tomorrow morning that hurt that I didn't know I had. The ice at its ultimate thickness was slightly better than five inches in depth; it took a five-pound hand-sledge and a brick-cutting chisel to break through it,

Dammit, I want warm weather. I miss my miniskirts!

[skirtingtherealissue]

Well we have snow in south east England and much of the rest of the UK too and c0 degrees C (c32F). Not a lot though, just a couple of inches and the country is at a standstill (how pathetic). The news channels and broadcasts are describing it as "severe" weather and we have strikes (I was a little too young to understand the winter(s) of discontent back in the 70s, but it all seems to be happening again).

Just how our North American and Scandanavian friends would cope if they had such severe weather (oh, you guys do get this and considerably worse).

Best way for keeping warm, as far as a I'm concerned is by staying indoors. If I have to go out (particularly when away skiing), I layer top and bottom in a traditional (un)commonsense fashion.

Hope you're all faring well and keeping warm.

Ash