Springing forward early this year!

Sofonisba, thank-you. It was easy enough to find.

bivbiv, I guess I take for granted that I walked to elementary school and rode the bus most the other years...but 10 years earlier makes a lot of difference! The world is a scary place.

mgh, our elementary kids have to get to school earlier than the HIGH SCHOOL???? Go figure. They are at the bus stops like an hour earlier than the high schoolers. But the schools are always extending their hours to. Pretty soon be dark when they go and when they get home when you add in the bus riding.

LOL@Huffy, I hope that daylight is saved for retirement! =)

Kelli, I wondered that same thing about the farmers??? bbinnji said it wreaks havoc on their animals, perhaps they can elaborate?

Tir, I forget about the bus rides. Our kids go to a private school where there is no bus service.....we drive them to and from school. Leave the house at 8:40 am and are to the school by 9am. I was lucky when I was a kid and had a short bus ride.

Animals have amazingly good time sense . . . if a farmer's cows are used to being milked at 6.00a.m. precise, they'll queue up spot on that time every day. Change it by an hour, and they won't be ready, and will give much lower milk yields, as well as be irritable. So you have to do the milking at the same real time every day. But the milk collection truck and the milk distribution depot work to DST, so they arrive at the farm before the cows have been milked, and then you're in deep trouble . . .

Resin

I went to school a LONG time ago. It was the first year my high school had split sessions -- too many kids for one session, and no money to build another school. So I got on the bus (7 miles from school) at 6:30 to start classes at 7:15. The worst thing we had to worry about then was rowdy boys on the bus, not kidnapping. Things have definitely changed!

Can't come soon enough for me!

I love daylight savings time, I just hate getting used to it. It's only an hour, but takes me a good week to adjust my internal clock.

Me too treelover3. I usually don't change my wrist watch for about a month later just so I can look down at it and smile that it's still daylight and I'm outside at 8:30p.m..

I worked at this job one year, and we had just started working outside starting at 7am. Then the next week the boss decided that we should start at 6am - the Monday after the clocks were set ahead. I don't think I ever got used to 2 hour change.

I do just the opposite, Cordeledawg. I leave my clocks on DST all the time. That way, when it's not daylight saving time and I momentarily think I'm late for something, I can have the delicious revelation that I still have another hour to get ready.

I too wish they would just leave it alone. Love the extra daylight.

I like the natural cycle of the earth's rotation and revolution. I don't need to be insulated from it! I find the sudden changes jarring and unnatural, takes me a while to recover.

I am 100% with you, mimitho. WHY can't it just be one time, all year???? It gets lighter earlier and later w/o us "changing time"! The Earth gets us used to longer days by changing gradually, the way we've been getting used to it for, oh, about 3 million years!

I would prefer to find one time that would be acceptable and then stick with it year around. I think I am in the minority.

We could just do away with clocks altogether and everybody just go by their "own" time. :) Wake up when we want, go to work, school, shopping, whenever we want, come home from where ever, when ever we want and go to sleep whenever we want. Can you imagine? Talk about confusion and havok .....


I like more daylight in our days, but it sure does take the ole' body time to adjust to the change, and then re-adjust again when we go back to DST. I'm like some of you other folks, it takes me a few days to acclimate and adjust to the new time.

I love daylight savings time but have trouble adjusting to the change of time. It is easier now that I have retired. I don't have to get up an hour earlier the next day. I just adjust naturally. I wish we could stay on daylight savings year round.

Daylight saving time did indeed begin in the United States during World War I, primarily to save fuel by reducing the need to use artificial lighting. Although some states and communities observed daylight saving time between the wars, it was not observed nationally again until World War II.
there are many places that do not turn there clocks back or foward some of these places are in the usa

Is there a petition we could get going to send to the powers that be telling them to keep the time the same!?

Tir_Na_Nog: Thanks for that great information. Some of it makes little sense though. No kid wants to go Trick or Treating before dark! Energy savings are a mystery to me. We heat or cool our homes based on temperature, not how light or dark it is outside. People still drive the same amount because they still have to go to work, shop or keep appointments. We cook the same amount of food, heat water for laundry and baths, turn on lights and tv's. There is no change in habits, just in our perception of what time it is.

I'm with those who wonder why can't it just be one time, all year. And, of course, the Universe doesn't know linear time so nature just goes about its business in its own perfect way.

June

I think that changing the clocks twice a year is a massive manipulation. For those who like to get up when it gets light, it puts a lot of us back in the dark for a month or two, especially those who live on the western edge of a time zone. I liked living in Quebec City. Although it's at about the same latitude as Helena, MT, it's on the eastern edge of the time zone, and it's light at 7:00 a.m., even with the time manipulations.

Time itself is an illusion, according to the theory of relativity. A very interesting one, though, since it's the one thing that's very equally distributed. Everyone has the same amount of time every day. And our total time here remains a mystery until we go.

I LOVE IT. I CAN GET SO MUCH MORE DONE IN A DAY.
DON'T LIKE TO DRIVE AT NIGHT yik to many deer cross my paths

Since our children are grown, and we are retired (from 9 to 5 jobs), our "working" days are generally from sunrise to sunset. The amount of daylight is seasonal and it doesn't matter what the clock says - unless there's a TV program you don't want to miss.

I hate coming home in the dark and never seeing my yard on weekdays. So I love DST! We should stick to it all year. To solve the important school bus problem, lets have kids go to school later. High school kids' brains do not work well at 7:30 a.m.There is a ton of research showing this. Plus to be in school for 7:30 classes, kids have to catch busses at 6:30 or earlier.
Dave
PS June, energy savings comes from not having to light up office buildings an extra hour a day.

I just heard on our local news that daylight time is an experiment this year, and that the Department of Energy will evaluate the energy savings from having daylight time start sooner and end later, and if it isn't much of a savings, Congress has the right to move it back to the way it was: the first week in April to the last sunday in October (or whatever it was...).

Some of the perks of getting 'older' ..........................

I voted 'other'. [ in my mind] being on my own clock on the farm here DST really makes no difference to me.

The amount of daylight is the same no matter what the clock says .

If I could get away with it I would rise with the sun and sleep when it is dark.
(Interesting book 'Lights Out')
But then I would not be on line this time of night.

Critters don't seem to agree though ;-((

Now back when the kids were home and had school that was a whole different story ....... LOL

An extra hour of daylight after work...yahoo!!! Besides, morning darkness won't last too much longer. The sun hasn't let us down yet. And, today's a snow day. Man, I'm in a good mood.

scotterbug: LOVE the picture, you are so original!!!! Awwwww.... =)

AAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!! I HATE ALL THIS MESSING WITH THE CLOCKS!! I like my husband's idea: split the difference (shift the clocks 1/2 an hour) and just leave it there.

Has anyone ever done any studies to determine if there really is any energy saving attributable to DST?

I hate daylight saving time. Being a morning person, it actually makes my day shorter because it gets light later. Not so bad for a retired person, because I can just adjust my sleeping (bother), but terrible when I was working. I used to get up early enough to get at least an hour in the garden before having to get ready for work. Didn't have enough energy left at the end of the day to do anything but putter. The only way I could protest was to refuse to change the clock in my car--the kids called it "Mom time."

Even if it does save energy to start and finish work earlier in the day, it still isn't necessary to change the clocks. Just change the office opening hours!

Resin

I'm Glad they lengthed it..just means more time in my gardens!!..Yeaaaaaaa!!!...Jeanne

No disrespect, but I had to laugh - "PS June, energy savings comes from not having to light up office buildings an extra hour a day." The company I worked for for 17 years had windowless buildings.

I agree with Resin - companies should be more flexible in their hours. Sometimes that may not be possible, but I'll bet that in most cases it is.

My guess is that it could save electricity at home, rather than at schools and offices. I assume that most schools and offices have the lights on all day so that it is easier to read and so on. My schools always did. It was a bit dark with no lights on, even with large windows. In the morning at home, those who go to school or work are probably going to be using about the same amount of electricity since bathrooms are usually not that well endowed with natural light, plus people are going to be running the hair dryer, coffee maker, toaster, microwave, water heater, etc., regardless of how much sun there is, so the bottom line is that there wouldn't be much electricity saved in the morning even if people got up at noon. Next, my guess is that in at least half the households, no one is home during the day. They've gone to schools and offices where the lights are going to be on all day regardless. At home, there should not be much energy use during the day at the empty houses, especially if people turn down or turn off the furnace or air conditioner. In the afternoon/evening, is when the energy savings begins. People won't have to turn the lights on until an hour later. However, people will still be running the air conditioner, fans, stove, t.v., radio, refrigerator, computer, lights in darker rooms like the basement, swimming pool filter, and on and on. At one time, I suppose that lights were pretty major energy users in a house, but we have so many other electric devices now days, it will be interesting to see how much energy is saved.

On a lighter note... ;)
Theory of relativity or not - in Lenka's world it's great to have extra time in daylight after work as I too photograph my flowers and often during the week. I don't get to do that in the morning, but only after work. So for me the only time during the week that I can spend taking pictures, working on my flowerbeds and examining the plants is after work. And I start getting into depressed mood if I don't have a chance to get my hands dirty for a few days... :)

It also means I have more opportunities to job outside instead of on the treadmill! I hate Daylight Savings Time when it happens but love it once I get used to it, if that makes sense. Everyone really drags into work on the Monday after though.

Don't forget to get the patch from Microsoft for your computers and MS Outlook...it's been a real pain at work getting everyone up to snuff on their computers. And, apparently, we paid $4,000 for some patch from Microsoft for some old server that we run some old legacy something on. You never think about all the behind the scenes things that have to happen when something like this is changed.

I wonder if we can say that the time changes contribute to a shorter life span? As several have noted, each time we change the time back and forth, our bodies have to fight to adjust. I'm going to start gettting up 15 minutes earlier Th - Sun and then hopefully I won't be too traumatised by Monday!

I wish I could have voted "Other".

I am an early bird, who gets up from 4a.m-5a.m., every morning-so I really look forward to the sunrise. Now it's going to be an hour later. :-(

I agree with those that wish we could do away with DST, all together!

I don't mind changing the clocks, and I'm lucky I guess-because only takes me the next night of sleep to adjust to the new time.

Deanna

I live in Utah, Dreary long cold winter, looking forward to more sunshine!

This means that I'll have an extra hour for gardening chores in the evening after work. Trying to get everything done on Saturday can be quite exhausting & the weather doesn't always cooperate. Really looking forward to it!

I will be glad to have more day but there is something about the early spring , when its light out so early and you can get up when its quiet, see an easter bunny or two and enjoy the solitude ya know?
laura

LOVE DST. Absolutely should be the time frame year round, in my opinion. Gives me so much more time outside in the evenings now - - - what could be nicer!