I'm Just Happy

Once again it’s time to disrupt (that may be a rather strong term, but I feel disruptive today) the normal flow of things and “spring forward” an hour in order to have more daylight at the end of the day. I know that doing this saves a little on energy consumption, and provides more time for people to do things during daylight after work, but we need to look at the morning hours and those of us who wake early enough to see the sun come up. I think that we are the forgotten of our society, and long to see amends made in our favor. Why should the night owls have all the fun?

Taking an hour from morning daylight means that I again will be waking in the dark, commuting to work in the dark, and otherwise feeling like I never quite got enough sleep the night before. I know that’s a small price to pay for the privilege of doing extra shopping at Wal Mart. It’s also a small price to pay to be able to garden, cut the grass, or whatever else we will do with our newly-found hour of daylight. Nevertheless, it is a price. I wonder if anyone has taken the time to discover how much discombobulation really happens in the lives of people that have the time jerked around a couple times a year.

Of course, there’s also the price to be paid in having to expend the energy to change clocks. I wonder if anyone has calculated how much energy is expended changing clocks versus how much energy is saved by moving daylight to the evening hours.

Of course, there are benefits as well. Some smoke alarm batteries would never be replaced if the government wouldn’t mess around with the time. Some people would never see the sun rise if daylight saving time didn’t happen once a year. And we would never know the joy of atomic clocks that, although they have nothing to do with atomic energy, receive radio signals regularly that automatically adjust their time to be correct, including springing forward or falling back. By the way, these radio signals which the Chinese clock factories use, have been in existence since 1956 from radio station WWVB, broadcasting at 50khz and 50kw E.R.P. out of Fort Collins, Colorado. Other radio stations also operated by the government have been broadcasting time signals for over 100 years, usually in the shortwave spectrum.

I guess that overall, though, the benefits outweigh the disruptions. Our government says so, and we all know that no one in government lies to us. Oh, occasionally there may be a misspeak or a misunderstand or embellishment, but never a lie. So dutifully I will set my clocks ahead an hour tomorrow morning (or tonight) and partake in that extra free hour of light so generously given by my government. And I am so grateful….