Twice a year, we do the time switch dance.
This is about the March switch but the Holderness family does a nice song about it. (Except, dear readers, it's Daylight Saving Time). This won an award for Best Use of a Recorder in a Song (umm, no, it didn't).Frankly, I'm tired of blogging about it. Here, you can read one of the many blog posts I have done on the topic.
Yes, it's time once again to have the debate. We who live in the United States get upset about it twice a year, except for those of us who live in Hawaii, or in those parts of Arizona not on the Navajo reservation.
It's time for "should we have daylight saving time" . Here are some of the pros and cons.
How many of us enjoy springing ahead an hour in spring, and then falling back an hour in fall?
And then we forget about it until it's time to switch again.
It makes me grouchy. It makes us all (I think) accident prone.
Apparently (sorry, Canadian readers) the Canadians implemented it first, the Germans made it popular, and someone from New Zealand invented it. A lot of countries (over 70 in 2021) use it, although the dates differ.
Although some 70% of Americans (according to a 2019 poll) oppose the practice, no one can seem to agree on exactly how it should end. We are split over year round daylight saving time or year round standard time. Or, should we go back a half hour so no one is happy?
I remember too well how, on January 6, 1974, we had Emergency Daylight Saving Time implemented. It was supposed to be for 16 months, due to the energy crisis. I don't have fond memories of stumbling to my 8am college class in the dark. Mercifully, the 16 month idea was scrapped.
Right now, in the United States, it is legal for a state to not implement Daylight Saving Time (which is why Hawaii and almost all of Arizona can do it), but that is the only deviation that is permitted.
So around and around we go. As the saying goes, where it stops, nobody knows. Florida has been trying for several years but their efforts are going nowhere.
Whatever happens, I hope I don't have to write too many more of these posts.
...I like DST.
ReplyDeleteI'm with you and the 70% of us who are ready for it to end. Very informative on the history...hard to believe it's been that long and truly is now history. I hope you don't have to write about it again much longer, although, our energy crisis continues in some way or another. I see I'm still on your Blog Roll and have popped up closer to the top again. Come see me!
ReplyDeleteI love the Holderness Family! That was a great video.
ReplyDeleteHalf my clocks will fall back automatically, the other half I will have to manually change. Grumble, grumble.
I'm glad you mentioned it! I would have forgotten until I started wondering why my phone had a different time than the microwave! I never remember how to set the car's clock. I don't mind now that I don't "lose or gain" an hour, since I don't work. I have been unhappy at how dark it still is at 8am, so now it will be 7am. The amount of daylight and dark will change no matter what we do, so in the end we'll get used to it, so they should just pick one and be done with it. It's not like we live where it's dark (or sunny) all the time. Or, maybe we do. I don't. You don't.
ReplyDeleteAh yes, the semi-annual disruption of everyone's circadian rhythms. Like just about anything the government does, it has the exact opposite effect of what they were trying to accomplish. It was suppoed to be for the farmers, who couldn't care less about it, because livestoick can't tell time, and it was to save nergy, which it didn't do and in fact made the problem worse. How in the world they suppose that changing the clocks would save energy... but The Great Minds In Washington, DC decided it was what all the cool kids were doing, so we're stuck with it.
ReplyDeleteI like Mountain Standard Time--the time of my youth. At our recent election, on the ballet, they inserted a 'time change' clause.
ReplyDeleteInstead of just saying, "Would you like to scrap changing the clocks twice a year?" they said something like, "Would you like to go to permanent Daylight Saving Time?" Well...I would like to stop changing the clocks, but I don't want Daylight Saving. I want Mountain Standard. Yikes! What do I check?! And it was defeated by a vote of 49.8 to 50.2. Sigh.
I'm not sure where the split would be on the 70% who want to end the time change. Me? I hate the dark afternoons of standard daylight time, and would rather stumble through the dark in the winter mornings than watch the sunset at 4:40pm.
ReplyDeleteI just reminded the class I'm in today about this. I figured they were the group that needed the reminding. So, I'm in the minority with my virtual shrug. I don't have much of reaction to this either way.
ReplyDeleteTime Change! Oh how I hate it.
ReplyDeleteI just want them to choose one and stick with it
ReplyDeleteI don't care what time we have as long as we stop switching the clocks. Don't get me started, lol.
ReplyDeleteYes! Seems more confusing and divisive than needed!
ReplyDeleteI hate it , makes me cranky:(
ReplyDelete