I still hate daylight savings time

Again, I wake today afflicted by daylight saving time. The fall DST ending is at least a little less onerous than the spring DST beginning. But I'll still find myself wanting lunch at 10:30 am and having to leave for work in the dark.

DST is basically a collective action motivated by a misplaced and unproven idea that we can save energy by making better use of daylight. In fact, DST is recognized as increasing energy use and costs. A new perspective on my aggravation at DST has emerged this election season as I see how very powerful collective action can be. A motivated group can have tremendous impact towards achieving a shared goal. What a shame that we waste that collective effort on something with so ambiguously beneficial as DST. What if instead we had a national event to "pick up one piece of litter" or "take a 10 minute walk"? We'd probably make a big change towards a cleaner environment or reducing American obesity with that effort - much more of an impact on those issues than we see on our energy use with daylight saving time.

If someone could show me a well-vetted scientific study showing that DST actually did have significant quantifiable benefits, I'd line up and comply without complaint. But as with many lemming-like popular movements, DST has not demonstrated that it has a real, measurable benefit.

I want my $3 back.

I still hate daylight saving time. Although I'm finally starting to adjust, now I can see daylight creeping later and later past my kid's bedtimes. Pretty soon it will be light as late as 10 pm. Grr.

Oh, and to add insult to injury, a new study calculates that Hoosier Households are spending $3 more on energy per year Study: Daylight saving boosts energy use - USATODAY.com. Too bad there is no money back guarantee if satisfaction wasn't assured with the time change -I'd be up at the statehouse asking for my $3 back so I could go get a Latte.

For more info about daylight saving time, check out my previous post I hate daylight savings time, where I reviewed an excellent book on the topic by David Prerau.

Sigh. It seems as though daylight saving time is as phony as... well, a $3 bill.

I hate daylight saving time

It is so stupid to artificially change time in some foolish attempt to trick everyone into doing their activities earlier. Ben Franklin had the idea originally; but if I read the legend of his idea correctly, it was a farcical idea, meant only in jest. Prerau quotes Franklin's reaction to a summer sunrise at 6 am:

"Still thinking it something extraordinary that the sun should rise so early, I looked into the almanac, where I found it to be the hour given for the sun's rising on that day... [others] will be as much astonished as I was, when they hear of its rising so early; and especially when I assure them that it gives light as soon as it rises!"

This is the man who was referenced as an early supporter of DST? I fear the recognition of sarcasm was indeed poorly developed in the past. I was happy to be moving to Indiana, where DST wasn't being observed when I made the decision to move here. And then, before I'd even enjoyed 1 season without, they changed to conform to national DST!! Trust my luck to change a 39 year tradition of Hoosier noncompliance. We next change again on Sunday morning, 10/28.

DST is supposed to help people to have more time to enjoy sunlight, but all it does for me is make me late everywhere. I absolutely never adjust. My kids get up at their usual time, my life operates on a bio clock not the artificial one - so DST helps me not at all. The energy savings seem like a joke - we're supposed to save energy by not needing lighting at night, so we can guiltlessly go on a consuming binge in the evening - using gas and resources anyway. The total energy savings rounds up to 1%, which amounts to a very negligible statistical amount of the 340 million BTUs most Americans use daily. Just data noise, really.

In an effort to understand the DST effort, and specifically the Indiana relationship to it (and whether I should hope for them to give up the DST experiment), I read David Prerau's Seize the Daylight. His work looks to treat DST historically, to chronicle its whys and wherefores, rather than to take one side or the other. After the posturing surrounding the change in Indiana, this was refreshing. I enjoyed the facts and anecdotes but, unfortunately, did not find any reason to be more favorably inclined to DST. Prerau's book is an excellent discussion of the issues and provides nice background and stories about DST incidents over time. It certainly solidified my sense of time as a social covention.

welcome back to real time America*!

(*excepting Hawaii, and Arizona, who never changed. except on the Rez. The Rez in AZ that is.)