Moving to Phoenix area from Wisconsin??? (home, scorpions, dangerous)

[ilovesun]

I agree with you boatdrinks-I think any city can get old after awhile-I lived here my whole life except for 4 years of college in the upper part of the state. It's just hard to go anywhere from here b/c there is nowhere interesting to go that is only a few hours drive. My fiance and I joked about getting a visitors guide to SC because maybe we were missing something-but even though we like the charm of the historic downtown area there really isn't much to do down there and once you've been to the plantations they don't change.
We are looking forward to our visit there and Cj81-just give your Cardinals a chance they're still a fairly young team and they are planning to draft an excellent db from my alma matter.

[MotleyCrew]

My husband just came back from VA during the horrible storm. He almost cried when he got back to Phoenix. We had enough of gloomy, snowy, rainy days too. Oh and yes the mountains are green but full of poison oak. Every leaf I touched had poison oak oil on it. Two years after moving here, I moved some of my husbands hand tools and got zapped with poison oak again. I will glady (well not gladly) take scorpions and snakes over poison oak. In the summer, just go shopping early and drink lots of water.

[Steve-o]

Talk to victims of snake bites (the ones that lived) and tell them youd rather take snakes over poison oak. A snake bite is probably the most horrid thing (if you have a bad reaction) you could ever experience. Ever been bit by a 6' Crotalus atrox (thats right in your area)? Ever experienced a black widow bite? How about a AZ bark scorpion sting? Youd be signing a different tune if you did. LOL Not trying to argue with you, but I just think that statement is really silly. Perhaps you need enlightenment? Please visit this link, it will be a real eye opener (warning: extremely graphic)... scroll through all 10 pages and ask yourself what youd REALLY rather have. LOL Snakes should NOT be taken lightly, thats the problem with the 35,000 snake-bite patients that the US rcvs every year (18K of those in AZ alone). People take them lightly with "oh Ive never seen one around here" or "oh, let me try and touch it real quick" or "oh, I forgot to check behind the junk in the garage before I reached back there". Those are the kind of folks who end up dead, severly crippled, amputated, etc... In AZ, you CANNOT let your guard down, especially in areas with higher snake populations. I work with these animals for Pete's sake, and I never let my guard down, but Ive still had close calls with rattlers in AZ, and I dont even live there! LOL

http://www.venomousreptiles.org/libr...ebite%20Photos

[steve22]

Originally Posted by Steve-o

Cj81, Id have to disagree. Its easier to warm up than cool off. You can dress for the cold, you cant for the heat. Yes the cold CAN hurt, but rarely, only a week or two of the year is sub zero in WI. 4+ months of skin-cancer-causing sun and its massive dehydrating effects are FAR worse than a handful of sub-zero days. And cooling off in the pool is great and all, but it becomes boring after awhile. The best way to cool off for the 4-5 months is stay indoors. Thats depressing as well. And Id rather be cold and shivering than blistered and burned. LOL

Absolutely right on there. The human body is much better equipped to warm itself up than to cool itself off. More people die every year as a result of heat-related exposure than all other weather-related phenomena combined. And bascially, for 5 months here, stepping outside feels like stepping into a blast furnace, even in the wee hours of the morning. Just keep that in mind. Bottom line: for about 4 months out of the year total, the weather here is gorgeous. In a word, perfect. But for the 5 months from late spring through mid-autumn, it's absolutely brutal. Cannot be overemphasized. BRUTAL.

[Steve-o]

True, it does get hot, but some smart thinking will alleviate most chances of heat stroke and the like. When it gets super cold here, I dress for it. Ive lived here 30 years and have never met a single person whos had hypothermia, not even a single case of frostbite. You just have to think before you act, ya know? LOL Heck, when its 0 degrees, you still see people out on snowmobiles on the trails. You prepare, and youre ok. In the heat, its different. You cant prepare for that. When I hiked Mummy Mountain in PHX last year, I brought up 3 bottles of water (BIG ones), and once I summited, I only had 1/2 a bottle left! The desert heat is no joke, it dehydrates you soooo fast its scary! Plus, we hiked in October only when it was 100 degrees, I wouldnt have made it in June/July/August/September. To make things worse, the water felt like it had been microwaved, it was so warm I could barely stand to drink it, and they were inside my backpack! LOL

[SatCure]

I've stayed in Phoenix a few times during July. Actually looked into moving there in 1987 (I'm in the UK) but there were big problems with the Hispanics flooding over the border at the time and getting a Green Card was just impossible.

I still love Phoenix. There are grassed parks, outdoor (public) swimming pools, beautiful malls with a better choice of foods than anywhere in England. The heat was unbelievable but, as long as I wore a wide-brim hat, it was bearable for a time. I didn't see any nasties. Only Gila monsters and small lizards. But I stayed mostly in the city, apart from a trip up to Flagstaff and a visit to Carefree.

I'll swap our British weather for Phoenix any time.

[Ponderosa]

Originally Posted by Steve-o

Talk to victims of snake bites (the ones that lived) and tell them youd rather take snakes over poison oak. A snake bite is probably the most horrid thing (if you have a bad reaction) you could ever experience. Ever been bit by a 6' Crotalus atrox (thats right in your area)? Ever experienced a black widow bite? How about a AZ bark scorpion sting? Youd be signing a different tune if you did. LOL Not trying to argue with you, but I just think that statement is really silly. Perhaps you need enlightenment? Please visit this link, it will be a real eye opener (warning: extremely graphic)... scroll through all 10 pages and ask yourself what youd REALLY rather have. LOL Snakes should NOT be taken lightly, thats the problem with the 35,000 snake-bite patients that the US rcvs every year (18K of those in AZ alone). People take them lightly with "oh Ive never seen one around here" or "oh, let me try and touch it real quick" or "oh, I forgot to check behind the junk in the garage before I reached back there". Those are the kind of folks who end up dead, severly crippled, amputated, etc... In AZ, you CANNOT let your guard down, especially in areas with higher snake populations. I work with these animals for Pete's sake, and I never let my guard down, but Ive still had close calls with rattlers in AZ, and I dont even live there! LOL

http://www.venomousreptiles.org/libr...ebite%20Photos

I saw the other day that the typical snake bite victim in AZ is a drunk, 30-ish male who was molesting the snake. You are distorting the risk of snake bite to the average outdoors person immensely.

She didn't say she would rather be bit by a rattler than get poison oak reaction. Her remark quite correctly implied that the risk of poison oak exposure in the east was so much higher than the risk of a venomous bite or sting in AZ that she preferred to take her chances with the snakes and the scorpions. I agree.

[Cj81]

I was not suggesting that the human body is better prepared to handle heat or cold I was just speaking of personal opinion. When I go to cold-cold places I freeze my buns off, I shiver and I can't move. I feel the cold down in my bones, it hurts or causes your fingers and toes to go numb. Its just not my thing. As for heat, well even on a really hot day 115 or so, you can still grab a bottle of water and a portable mister and find a nice place in the shade to sit down. Its all preference, I hate freezing my buns off and don't mind the heat, others hate the heat and would prefer to freeze thier buns off. I guess people should just move accordingly.

[Steve-o]

Yes, most bites occur to inebriated individuals, no doubt. But there are 10s of thousands (let that sink in) of people that are bit because they step on them, or reach to grab something, etc. Those are the most common bites in the world. Each year 30K people die from snakebites, mainly in other countries, but the accidental bites far outnumber the deserved bites.

Im NOT distorting the risk of snake bite immensely, youre gravely mistaken here. Spend a little time watching the show "Venom ER" and youll see with your own eyes. Sure, drunken bites occur on a daily basis, but the # of unprovoked bites far outnumber them.

As for the poison ivy/oak, its miserable getting it on you, but far less damaging and definitely not as lethal as neurotoxic venom coursing through your veins.

[Steve-o]

Strangely, I still cannot edit my posts??? In my first sentence I meant to write "yes, alot of bites", not "most".

Why cant I edit my posts? Hmmmm...