Winter — the chance to grow a luxurious beard

Dear Hipster: What is the best place to be a hipster during the wintertime? Is it a Colorado resort? The desert? Alaska? Florida? Whatever the place — why? — Dana, City Heights

Hipsters love certain things about the winter: thick, fluffy flannel shirts and jackets fit for lumberjacks; the chance to grow a luxurious beard; hot toddies made with imported rum and a dash of handmade bitters; ugly Christmas sweater parties; butternut squash ravioli; and mourning the loss of the daylight.

Hipsters also hate certain things about the winter, like shoveling snow and seasonal affective disorder.

The obvious solution is to pick some place like...oh, I don’t know, perhaps San Diego, California? Cold enough to invoke the former benefits, yet free of the actual hard, horrible stuff that makes winter such an epic bummer for the upstanding hipsters in places such as NYC, Chicago, and Boston.

Pretty much anytime you can soak up all the benefits of something without any of the drawbacks, you have a prime opportunity for hipster interest. Some people want to call that a bit disingenuous, but I really think they’re just envious of the fortunate hipsters who are having their gluten-free cake and eating it, too.