Weather in Abilene (Houston, Fort Worth, Lubbock: mobile home, unemployment, transfer)

[jcsm]

I live in Mountain Home, AR. I am considering a move to Abilene but I have many questions on the weather there. I have been watching the weather channel and see you are having a lot of severe weather. Is this normal? I also see the humidity is higher then the area I am presently trying to leave. Do you have a lot of flooding and if so what areas?

I get so many different answers when talking to people in this area, some people say they would never move to Abilene do to the tornados and weather. Could you please enlighten me to what I can expect. Humidity, dew point, and extreme heat with the humidity is a big issue.

Why are the allergies so high? Is this the way the year goes. We need to get away from this area due to molds, allergies & extreme humidity. The humidity NEVER goes away here, in Mountain Home, AR. The grass is wet from morning until night you can't even mow your lawn. The summer months get in the upper ninety’s with high humidity and dew point. It is so miserable here, you can't walk out side with out losing your breath or breathing nothing but water.

We will also need the best care in Cardiac, Allergies and mold specialists. Do you know if Abilene can assist us in these areas?

Please tell me about the Abilene so we can make up our minds weather or not this is the right move for us.

[Roma]

If you want to get away from all the humidity you need to look more west.

I'm just a little east of Abilene, in Granbury. To me, the weather is severe. The weather is the main reason we are planning on moving. To some other people, the weather seems fine and normal. So it depends on who you talk to.

You're coming from Arkansas, so I would imagine the weather would be similar.

[teatime]

Well, I moved here last fall and so I've experienced three of the four seasons. It's funny, because the big majority of the bad weather misses Abilene. Some locals have told me it's because we kinda sit in a "bowl" with all of the plateaus and ridges around us. Others say it's because we have so many churches, LOL.

One thing's for sure -- it's a lot less humid than the areas even just south and east of us. I don't mind heat if it doesn't always come with humidity. I enjoy a good storm and we get them but nothing really destructive, knock on wood. We had a few ice storms this winter and it actually snowed on Easter weekend! Again, the locals told me this was a colder winter than usual. I LOVED the bit of snow! We got maybe two inches and I don't think it lasted a whole day.

I like seasons, and I missed them when I lived in South Texas. Hot and humid and hotter and more humid got really annoying for me. Plus, I have a health condition that comes with arthritis pain in the joints and the humidity made me swell up badly.

This is a beautiful area -- the sunsets are gorgeous, as are the cloud formations. I guess it all depends on what you want!

[Jim Finn]

Consider Lubbock: We have been here a year and love it. We came from a humid part of the country because it is not humid here. We considered Abaline but found out it is a bit more humid than here. Lubbock has a low cost of living and it is dropping. Houses are cheap and the people are GREAT! Lubbock has over 200,000 people so there is plenty to do here and excellent medical facilities. Unemployment here is 3%. We came here to retire and love it!

[catman]

jcsm: I live in Fort Worth, 150 miles east of Abilene. This spring has been exceptionally wet and stormy. I can't remember a spring when it was either raining or threatening to for two months, but it's very unusual. Abilene is less humid than Ft Worth, but the farther west you go, the drier it gets. Tornadoes are less frequent around Abilene than Ft Worth.

[cdickinson4]

I have lived in abilene for about 15 years, the weather is normally pretty consistant, with the exception of this year, the winter was the coldest we have had since I have been here and the spring has had more rain than we normally get all year. Normally summers are hot, upper 90s to low 100s but not much humidty, fall stays fairly warm until the end of november, winters are not that bad normally 50s, but we do get our spells of drastic cold fronts, it can go from 80 to 40 in a couple of hours. Once march comes around were normally warming back up. We also have 2 large hospitals with lots of specialist around. I dont have allergys so I cant help you there. Hope this helps some, Good Luck!

[hissy_fitgirl]

I didn't find the weather too bad at all. I was there for 6.5 hrs - as you can tell I still miss it, I've been out of TX for a month now.

Of all the 6.5 yrs, I think I've only heard of one or two tornados touching down. It's not very popular for tornados - something about being low, like Cdickinson mentioned.

I'm in MS now and I really do like it - but if anyone were to complain about whether, it would be me. The air is as thick as mud here.

[Manco]

I lived in Abilene Texas for 8 years because of a work transfer before heading back to my native region, the west coast. Although the locals there like to believe, and will tell you without hesitation, that the climate is "great" (one even told me the weather in West Texas is "The best in the world" LOL), here's what I experienced: several times the sky turned brown with blowing dust for a period of about 3 or 4 days. Everything in the house was covered with a fine dust, even though all of the windows were closed. I actually had to cover my face with a handkerchief to get relief from the smell and taste of the dust. I have never seen anything like this anywhere else, and I've lived in several areas. The winters were cold, with temperatures around freezing, and snow and ice occurred 4 of the 8 years I lived there. The summers were warm, usually comfortable, sometimes hot, but not too bad if you don't mind humidity. And then there's the storms and tornadoes. Most of the locals don't fear them simply because they are so used to all of the warnings that the NWS issues turning out to be "false alarms", so there's an attitude of "It never happens here". The comment in an earlier post about the number of churches in the city offering some "protection" against tornadoes is so rediculous it doesn't even merit consideration! And newsflash people, since tornadoes are a meteorological phenomenon, surrounding terrain has absolutely NOTHING to do with protection. Most people in tornado territory live in denial, thinking that it always happens to the other guy, but it won't happen to them. Most of the storms I experienced came in the evening to late night hours, and I spent many consecutive sleepless nights hold up in a storm cellar waiting for a possible strike. The WORST part about living in tornado territory is that even if you don't have a direct hit from a tornado, you STILL are terrorized by the possibility everytime the clouds roll in and the weather man says the words "Tornado warning". That's no way to live. You can have it! I eventually left the area for literally greener pastures!

[teatime]

Sheesh, chill, dude! My church comment was a JOKE! (I believe I put LOL in the sentence somewhere!)

If you live anywhere on the Plains you have to be prepared for severe storms. If storms freak you out, don't move to the country's midsection. However, there hasn't been a really damaging tornado in Abilene for 30 years, knocking on wood and hoping we don't get one anytime soon.

I happen to think thunderstorms are really cool. I'm not freaked by them. We've had two severe ones in the 10 months I've lived here but they didn't damage my mobile home. No big ole dust storms, but once there was a brief orangish tinge to the sky. Lubbock gets a BUNCH of dust storms and, actually, I think they are pretty cool, too. We once saw a literal wall of dust on TV once!

Areas to the south and east of us get a lot worse weather, especially DFW. No place I know has perfect weather. But, as I said, anyone who can't handle frequent thunderstorms shouldn't move to Texas.

[Manco]

OK, I'm chillin'! I know that the church comment wasn't taken seriously by you (I saw the "LOL" you added), but from what I remember about the general population in Abilene it wouldn't surprise me if some people there actually believe it, which is why I mentioned it. And I agree that if someone can't handle severe storms they shouldn't go to that area of the country. I went to Abilene because of work reasons, and had actually never even heard of the town before that. I will say that while I lived in Abilene I traveled to just about every other part of Texas, and I think the worst place as far as overall environment was the Houston area. Nothing appealing about it whatsoever. At least Abilene has the small town appeal, if nothing else.