> I know that feeling all too well. I get mocked whenever my friends and I go to the lake because I just can't take the cold water. I think it is because my body temperature is naturally low or something.

I'm sure lakes in Canada are cold, but I'm also pretty sure they don't have anything on the Atlantic Ocean. I've never set foot in a lake that was even close to the temperature of the Atlantic. The sun doesn't even warm it up on hot summer days.

At any rate, this comment spawned a big and confusing debate about body temperature and what other temperatures feel like. We've got Travholt that says one's body temperature is lower in the morning, and Mousie that says it's higher. I'm not sure which it is, but I think I side with Travholt on what would seem right.

I don't think it's the shock to the system that is what registers as "cold" to us so much as what the temperature of your body heat combined with what you're immersed in that counts. As an example, let's say you eat some ice cream. It's cold, and tastes good. The inside of your mouth feels cooler as you eat, and if you eat ice cream too fast, before your body heat can warm your mouth back up, it can get REALLY painful right around the roof of your mouth. The least uncomfortable way to eat ice cream is to do so immediately after a swig of hot chocolate or some other hot drink. (Not that I recommend doing this -- sudden temperature changes can crack your teeth.)

To use Grishny's coleslaw example, let's say the coleslaw is a nice chill 50 degrees F. If your hands have just been in front of the heater, and the surface of your hands are 80 degrees, when you immerse them in the coleslaw, true, it'll feel cold, but the combined temperature is going to be around 65.

If your hands are COLDER than the coleslaw, because you've just been having snowball fights with your bare hands, and your hands are 40 degrees F on the outside, then the coleslaw may feel warmer by comparison, but the combined temperature will still only be around 45, and you'll still feel colder than if your hands were warmer.

More likely, your hands are room temperature, maybe 70 degrees, and the combined temperature is going to be 60. Not bad. Not so much of a change as if your hands were hot to begin with, but you won't feel as warm, either.

I appreciate the fact that if you are warm to begin with, you're going to have quite the temperature change, but after thinking about it, I'm inclined to side with Travholt -- it's not the differential that matters so much as the particular temperature you end up at when you combine whatever temperature you are immersed in, raised by however much your body heat can compensate for.

S "note that combined temperatures probably are rarely exact averages" am