Remember: it’s that weekend. The return to standard time can be a bit of a shock in the late afternoon, but I rather enjoy it. Whenever weather and insects permit, I like to sit on the porch or in the garden as the sun goes down, and this is the best time of year to do that. The streetlights and the solar lanterns come up slowly, and I anticipate the imminent entrance of the dazzling stars. Resplendent in flannel, I’m primed for an evening at my favorite theater. Afterward, there still will be time for a bowl of chili and a respectable hour of repose. For me, it never gets old. Of course, when I was young, I favored the return of daylight saving time and an extra hour of frivolity. Nothing really changes but our perspective.
Dark Passage
By Jimmy Johnson
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30 responses to “Dark Passage”
Saturday morning, at least here im Michigan, is the latest time that the sun will rise. Before they moved it out a week to November, the latest was in early January.
I like the idea of getting an extra hour of sleep, but I usually stay up later Saturday night!
Where I live sunset tomorrow (11/2) comes at 6:21 pm MDT. On Sunday (11/3) it’ll come at 5:20 pm MST. If it’s not cloudy I’ll be setting up my telescope and checking out the setting crescent moon (it’ll be about 5% illuminated, a very slender crescent indeed).
I just wish they’d Symply leave the Fargone time alone….reminds me of the Indian blanket metaphor…
I think of that blanket every year at this time and again when we spring forward. I’m in favor of just leaving DST locked in year-round. We’ve got it almost two thirds of the year now anyhow. Not one of Ben Franklin’s better jokes: (Benjamin Franklin is often credited with the idea of Daylight Saving Time (DST), but it’s a bit more complicated than that. In 1784, Franklin wrote a satirical essay titled “An Economical Project” for the Journal de Paris, where he humorously suggested that Parisians could save on candles by waking up earlier to make use of natural daylight1. However, Franklin’s proposal was not meant to be taken seriously and was more of a witty commentary on the habits of Parisians. From the Franklin Institute fi.com via CoPilot)
Cheers from Wisconsin, Dan
I would rather stick to Standard Time.
I’m with “Lost in A-Squared” — The highest priority is getting rid of the constant changing. But the option to go with on a permanent basis should by preference be Standard Time rather than Daylight Saving Time.
(BTW, I think “Daylight” is part of the name only of “Daylight Saving” and there isn’t really a “Daylight Standard”.)
The sky is a hazy shade of winter…
At least it’s not a whiter shade of pale…..
As much as I love S&G’s original, I prefer the Bangles’ version (especially the Official Video – but I wish they hadn’t spent so much time on the movie clips instead of the band if you catch my meaning, if you get my drift, nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say n’more).
When I had kids in school, I hated DT in the fall as it was so dark in the morning, so the return to ST was much better. Now, as a retired person, I don’t care either way!
This page looks absolutely snazzy, JJ!
BTW, if we’re voting, I’d prefer DST for its lighter evenings.
“Nothing really changes but our perspective.”
I wish that I could agree. I won’t go into the why.
We’ve switched back to normal wintertime a week ago and I am still adjusting. It did help that we both were knocked down with the flu most of the week and still not out of the woods yet. Fever is down, but the coughing and sniffling cold is still with us.
For me, they may keep this time forever, I hate switching twice a year. But our government and European Committee think it poses too many difficulties to change it like that. Don’t know which, but there you have it.
The front page looks great. I like the newspaper look.
I don’t care which one it is, just pick one and stick to it!
But it coulkd be (and has been) worse; when I was a kid, it was town-by-town. I don’t recall which switched and which didn’t, but half the year it was the same time at our house and my grandparents’, and half it was an hour different. 15 miles away, in the same county.
I have a question about maintenance cartoon where Janis is talking about their lawn being rolled. I took me a minute to figure it out what she was talking about since we’ve always referred to it as being TPed, Is “being rolled” a regional term?
In Memphis in the late 60s it was “rolled” — Here in Utah when my kids were teens it was “TPed.”
My primary concern about staying on “fast time” year round is little children walking to the bus stop or school in the dark.
Regarding time: Would it be some great electronic tragedy to adopt a time frame halfway between standard and daylight? Y’know, a half-hour different from both…and then stay with it. Just tossing this out there without serious thought.
Here’s my idea from long ago:
If we are going to have time shifts, let’s do them on Friday nights. That way, people will have an extra day to adjust before the work week begins.
I need a week or more to truly adjust. I’m already having to get up at 530 to work, and having it turn to 430 overnight is just not enough time. I’m zombified for a long time after and work is very difficult the first week.
I was on the road when this was posted so I didn’t get to comment then. Personally I enjoy standard time and wish it were all year. But I am an early riser and retired so I can get started and get done earlier. Like jimmy I enjoy sitting out back as the sun sets and sort of watch everything slowing down. What I don’t want is permanent Daylight Savings as it being purposed by several of our elected representatives. If that were enacted it would mean sunrise in some places would be around 9 am. It was done in 1974 and did not even make it a year before bringing back standard time because it was so unpopular.
Jimmy the site is really looking good. Keep up the good work.
If I didn’t love the night sky so much, DST wouldn’t bother me so much. During my trucking years I moved from one time zone to another with no real issues. As long as I managed to get 6.5 or more hours of sleep in a day I was good to go.
I am enjoying the contents on the site, although I am looking at it on a desktop computer. DST makes living on this side of the Pacific a bit of a chore. I have to keep recalibrating what time I can call family in the states (I have family on the West Coast and in Chicago). I once had a Zoom conference at four o’clock in the morning because of the time difference between here and the East Coast. Hope everyone is well and not too stressed out about November 5. Stay safe and sane, all.
I like retired time. When you get up your up, when tired you go to sleep. However, Naps are now mandatory. Don’t need no stinking clock.
We are living on “retired time” here too… but since we like to be on time for all our various appointments, we do rely on our “stinking clocks” and need them to be accurate!
It’s time for a complete overhaul of how we keep track of time — a practical solution that saves time and money and is good for our health, too.
We should scrap our current system of time zones and daylight savings in favor of worldwide adoption of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), also known as Greenwich Mean Time. This would mean that everyone’s watches around the world would be set at exactly the same time. The only difference they would notice, depending on where they are located, would be where the sun is in the sky at a particular hour. Thus midday would be as it is today in all parts of the world, when the sun reaches its highest point in the sky. What would be different under UTC is the time on your watch. In New York, midday would no longer be 12:00 P.M., but rather 5:00 P.M. (17:00 UTC).
The adoption of UTC would not mean that people would be going to work in darkness in certain parts of the world. Business hours would be adjusted to UTC. For example, while businesses in London would still open at 9:00 A.M. and close at 5:00 P.M., in New York, under UTC, they would open in the morning at 2:00 P.M. and close eight hours later at 10:00 P.M.
Adoption of UTC would allow for a return to “true time” — that is, solar time. With that, everyone around the world would rise with the sun in the morning and go to sleep when it’s dark at night according to their natural circadian rhythm, not some artificial time constraint. Social jet lag and its negative health effects would become a thing of the past.
Pilots, for the obvious benefits of safety, already use UTC. Wall Street uses it, too — all global stock and commodity trades are stamped in UTC. And that’s not all. Virtually all modern technologies, including the Internet and GPS, have spontaneously adopted UTC. It’s time for the rest of us to do the same.
That would solve a lot of problems! Of course the first few years of it would be somewhat chaotic as people adjust to it.
I’m reminded of J. Vernes’ “Around the World in Eighty Days.” A major plot point revolved around a watch left on London time throughout the story.
Speaking of cursing…
For three summers, I worked in a local glass factory so that I could pay my college bills. Being a “college boy,” I was not really accepted by the career glassworkers. I was not treated rudely but was not seen as a regular guy. One day, that all changed in a few seconds.
One day, something went wrong for me, and I let out a long string of curse words and phrases that would impress a Marine sergeant. The workers stopped what they were doing and just stared at me. Then, they all started laughing, and I was one of the gang from that day on.
Speaking of Marines, Happy Birthday.