Literally everywhere has its trade offs. ~Oct-July is cool and wet. This year has been colder and snowier already than it normally is, and we had a major ice storm that sent the region into a shitshow frenzy. Wrecks all over the place, airport turns to madness (it usually is anyway), mountain passes close but there’s huge pile ups. Seattle and metro has a LOT of hills making navigation really dicey and dangerous. But It does stay green in winters especially since we are the Evergreen State - with so much coniferous growth in our landscape. Also, ~July-Oct is intense sun, heat, drought and wildfire season come fall. 2021 we had a deadly heatwave. Last summer 2022 we broke records for days 90F or over. The region is catching up with new builds but barely half of people have air conditioned homes. All the greenery ends up looking so limp, dull and thirsty, and grass gets burned to a crisp in very dry summers. Get choked out by smoky poor air quality towards the end, like we did for nearly 2 months last Sept-Oct. I “fear” that time of year because the smoke can make you feel like absolute garbage. The Olympic Peninsula, way West region of the state, is a temperate rainforest and stays the greenest. East of the Cascade range in Eastern WA is a completely different climate than Seattle/Puget Sound. That said, I grew up in the Midwest though so not as cold or snowy is appreciated.

Yeah, we were just doing some light gardening today. Some things do die back, but there's a whole lot of green left.