Well, the good thing about this time change thingy is that it gave me a chance to check which of the clocks I have needed new batteries! I usually see a dead clock and think, "I need to change the battery on that clock". Of course, I never get around to it, especially since more important things such as food, sleep, and video games have an unusual capacity of intruding into my time.

:-D

oddity-
my cell phone reset itself, DS's didn't-and we share a family plan from the same provider. Both phones were set with "Daylight Savings Auto" turned on.
Oh well-it was too dark this morning, but this evening should be nice.

Cece - Both my cell phone and my land-line cordless phone were wrong this morning. So, I used my cell phone to call my land line. That updated the cordless, but not the cell. So then, I called my cell from my land line and voila - that updated the cell phone. It appears that an incoming call triggers the reset of the phone. Could that explain the difference between your and your hubby's phones? (However, I do believe that when traveling, my cell phone has adjusted its time between time zones without receiving an incoming call, though I can't swear to that.)

Well, I'm off to buy a new clock. How many clocks did others have to reset? And what is the most unusual object in your home with a built-in clock?

Just 3 clocks here plus my wrist watch--and the microwave. I haven't looked into my cellphone yet because I never use it. Or the VCR because I very rarely use it.

The computer made the change automatically, thanks to the Microsoft patch update.

There are no unusual objects around here with a built-in clock unless you'd count my cat. She wakes me up every morning about two minutes before my alarm would go off.

Nine clocks, including the microwave, plus two in the cars. My cell phone is an antique and has no clock; it doesn't even fold in the middle. Two are on radios, one on the m-wave, and one on the kitchen stove; that leaves a Seth Thomas-type in the den, a gift-cuckoo in the hall, an alarm in each of two bedrooms, and a pretty little Waterford that was a gift. I also have three pretty clocks that aren't working. Oh, and the one on the computer, of course, which did reset itself.

Now that we're retired, I'm not really sure why we need to know what time it is anyway.

Oh gosh, the microwave - I forgot that one. So, I live in a 13-clock house. Bad sign.

jwttrans - That's an amazing cat you have. I wonder if he/she knows about the Energy Policy Act of 2005. I hope you're not late to work on Monday.

Cece - As I reread your post, I figured out that DS is probably not your hubby - duh! I admit to not understanding all those D abbreviations, but I should be smart enough to know that S is not for hubby.

This is, frankly, one of the daftest pieces of legislature enacted in the US since panicky members in New Jersey, a hundred years ago, tried to push through legislation banning the use of X-rays in opera glasses for the sake of maidenly modesty.

Even after the great Year 2000 software upgrade, no-one thought to ask the question of any computer companies or financial institutions - how does this affect you?

And, unfortunately, it affected every one of them. There are standard rules which are set up in the computers to deal with timezone changes. These are all based on a standard set of rules which have been set up in computers and tested over and over, every year. And still, every six months, something goes wrong when the clocks change.

And then - they decided to change these rules with only about eighteen months notice.

As a result of which, every internation financial institution has spent a ridiculous amount of money over the last eighteen months repatching and testing the many millions of computers they have to ensure that they work with the new date.

The amount of money spent has VASTLY outweighed any possible financial saving of energy due to the new time difference.

I speak from the heart here, as I work for a large US bank. Fortunately I am not directly affected, but several members of my team have all been working this weekend, ensuring that all our trading systems have still got their times lined up correctly. And they'll have to do it again in October.

It looks like we're OK in our bank. But of course, that doesn't help if a system we're trading with has got things wrong.

There will be some unpicking to do on Monday, without a doubt.

What a damn stupid STUPID thing to have done.

I agree with Martin's assessment. Expected savings of $200 million out of a $13 trillion economy? I wish DST would be eliminated altogether.

I counted 24 clocks/devices that show the time, including thermostat, cable boxes, TIVO, computers, phones, car, watch, thermometers, clock radio, shower radio, etc. Most of those automatically changed the time. I have a couple of clocks that I never change because I usually know what hour it is, I just need to check the minutes. I never counted before -- the total was quite surprising.

Given a choice, I would rather the time stay the same all year round, whether DST or not. As a night person, it takes me a long time to recover from losing an hour.

Frances - ah, but that extra hour in bed in October....!!

All of the above problems make me happy that we don't have daylight saving in Iceland. We just happily tick on GMT all year long.

Every couple of years or so some idiot in business or the Parliament publicly suggests that we adopt daylight savings for trade reasons, but they have never had much following.

I agree wholeheartedly with Martin. Besides, I think that the change had nothing to do with saving energy and everything to do with commerce. The worst part is that it was just beginning to be light enough in the mornings that the kids didn't have to catch the school bus in the dark. Now they're back to heading to school before the sun is up.

I just counted up the number of clocks I changed and stopped at twelve. If there are thirteen, I really don't want to know! *g*

The whole time thing is a bit contentious in South Australia. Our DST doesn't end for another three weeks, left on for a lot of festivals happening about now.
But there is a fairly constant push from parts of the business community for SA to adopt Eastern Time to put us in line with NSW and Victoria. Our half hour different time zone (one of the few in the world) is already too far to the east, with most of the population living on about the same longitude as Adelaide. We should really be an hour behind the eastern states. And with modern communications - fax, email, mobile phone - I don't understand at all why business can't cope with a half hour time difference. Would anyone suggest midwest cities adopt eastern time to fit in with New York? I doubt it.

I would prefer to stay on standard time all year. It just feels natural to me, whereas DST does not. I hate dropping my child off at school when it is still dark out, and I hate even more trying to get my kids to go to bed at their usual time when it is still light outside. It's a battle some nights.

It is rather humorous to realize how many clocks we have.... Fortunately I live in a state that decided against DST long ago (we don't need an extra hour of 115 degrees in the summer, thank you very much) The whole thing never made sense to me, seems a waste of time and money, and I am always forgetting if I am two or three hours away from the east coast when I am making phone calls....

Oh, the thermostat - I forgot that one too. Now I'm up to 14 clocks.

I also work for a US bank, Martin, and you're right that this change is a huge hassle for our IT Department. A somewhat comical piece of this is that our IT group feels that the patch for Outlook causes more trouble than it's worth, so we are not patching and we have all been instructed to assume that our calendar appointments are probably an hour off for the next three weeks - and double-check. What a mess!

I hate daylight savings time anyway. If we have to have it all, we should at least leave it alone.

One good thing about the state of Arizona is that they refuse to play this stupid game. Sensible people.

I haven't changed my clocks yet.

Rosefolly

Including the car, I have 16 things with clocks in and around the house. That's including three computers (well, working ones), a thermostat, microwave, a wristwatch, a cell phone, and a whole host of wall clocks. Funny thing is, the computers have all been adjusted as well as the clock radio in the bedroom and at least one of the wall clocks but I think there's two wall clocks and a microwave which haven't been adjusted. The microwave perpetually has the wrong time. One wall clock is, uh, just wrong. A VCR is constantly flashing 12:00 (I can't be bothered to adjust it!). The thermostat is either off by an hour or is finally correct again.

Basically, my house has about ...... 5 time zones.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, I live by myself. :-D

(oh, and people should remember to adjust the wristwatches they have that they're not wearing!)

We don't do Daylight Savings Time in Hawai'i. I'm glad that I don't have the hassle of changing clocks at home twice a year. But when most everybody else in the US is on DST, it puts us even further behind -- in the winter months we are two hours behind the west coast and with the change it's three hours.

As there is only one sparsely-populated time zone between us and the International Date Line to our west, we perpetually trail most everybody in time -- and everything else, it often seems. I log in to RP and all your conversations are hours old. Sometimes if I stay up late enough I can actually be on at the same time as the UK early risers; but by then I've entered my sleepily stupid phase and if I try to respond I will likely muddle what I want to say. Oh well.

Kath, I think you and I share only about three-and-a-half hours of the same day!

Daylight saving is a huge bone of contention here in Western Australia as it has been tried and rejected three times by Referendum but some politicians managed to sneak it in halfway through this Summer and we are supposed to get it for another two years before yet another Referendum. Which will be ignored probably! It does not suit us to have dark mornings and have to eat in the hot evenings. I can ignore the time change mostly as I am retired and make my own hours but it is hard on farmers and families.My laptop lost the internet when I changed the time and my favourite 'large print' clock shows the correct time but day and date of yesterday! Two weeks to go to normality...

Here in the UK feelings always run high when the clocks go back/forward but it is not a East-West split but North-South, as the folk living up in Northern Scotland or the Orkney and Shetland Isles have fewer hours of daylight in the winter and what they call the 'simmer dim' during June/July.
I would be quite happy if they left things be, so we just kept to GMT (or Universal Co-ordinated Time as my husband insists on calling it) so the sun was overhead at mid-day, God was in His Heaven and all was right with the World . . . in a manner of speaking. ;-)
Are any of you familiar with the Royal Observatory at Greenwich? Lots of interesting information and old scientific instruments on display.

Here is a link that might be useful: Royal Observatory Greenwich

>our IT group feels that the patch for Outlook causes more trouble than it's worth, so we are not patching and we have all been instructed to assume that our calendar appointments are probably an hour off for the next three weeks - and double-check.

Same here. That's exactly what our IT Dept has advised, too.

Vee -

>Are any of you familiar with the Royal Observatory at Greenwich? Lots of interesting information and old scientific instruments on display.Yes, I visited the Royal Observatory at Greenwich some years back (late 90's I think) and you're right - very interesting. I'd like to visit it again some time. Along with the wonderful exhibits, it's really fun for us foreigners to plant our feet exactly on the Greenwich Meridian that we've heard about from childhood. Stand on it, hop across it, leap ... oh yeah.

In the US military, GMT is called Zulu time. That time zone is designated Z which in the NATO phonetic alphabet is Zulu.

I forgot about our watches--that's two more.

Kentucky is divided between the Eastern and Central time zones. Louisville used to be in Central but changed to Eastern in the early 60s, saying since we are such a "metropolis" we need to be on the same time as New York City. Actually, it's all a trick so the businessmen have more time to play golf after work. Never mind that the kids catch the school busses in the dark. My home county, 80 miles away, is on Central time. I, too, wish we didn't observe DST at all.

I read that one of the so-called reasons DST was extended through the first weekend in November was so the kids would have an extra hour of daylight to trick-or-treat on Halloween. I can only hope that this is only something a reporter made up and not an actual fact.

While testing changes made to a program relative to this change, we compared some test records to some actual records from last year's timeframe. Through this testing, we discovered issues with records from last year's timechange which apparently went undetected by the business. Does anybody really know what time it is? Hehe.

I especially liked it when MS suggested everyone check every appointment they have scheduled during the timeframe of the change, both in the spring and the fall. Now that instilled real confidence. Also, I believe the legislation was written so that if it was determined that this change did not have a positive effect (on what I'm not sure) then the option is there to revert back to the old DST dates. Oh, great!

Things were pretty quiet over the weekend, however the next real test will come when folks start their month end closing processes in early April. Hehe.

>One good thing about the state of Arizona is that they refuse to play this stupid game.

Nah - its not that they are sensible, its that the state is run by very conservative folks who think sundials were probably just fine thank you very much

Oh yes, loved the place! We went soon after I had finished reading Longitude by Dava Sobel, so had enough background information to really appreciate the old clocks and some of the history of the place.

I was last there in 2002 - it was Science Week in the UK, and they wound up all four of Harrison's legendary chronometers and had them all running simultaneously.

Couldn't miss that!

Here is a link that might be useful: Harrison's H4

So far no puffs of purple smoke have come out of any timed appliances-but the DVD player is off. We are waiting to see if it resets in a couple weeks...it is new and we don't know what will happen-but we don't tape much anyway.

Personally, I hate waking up in the dark, but don't care which they choose-just pick and leave it alone. Forever and ever amen. The switch (either way) leaves me fuzzy-headed for a week.
During WWII, didn't England have double daylight savings time? How horrid.
color-I believe it. Let them catch the bus every morning in the dark, but by all means light up trick or treat, that tradition of asking perfect strangers for food, otherwise known as begging!! (Is there a "Scrooge-list" for Halloween? Sign me up.)
all my watches have dead batteries-I have been waiting a month to get them changed and set by the jeweler....hehehehehe!

My most annoying time change timing problem is with my programmable TV. It downloads the correct time, but it keeps the programming keyed to the previous time. For example, I have the 11 news turn on automatically. Until I reprogram it, it now comes on at midnight.

Sorry I cannot remember where I read it in the last couple of days, but apparently there is a move afoot to make DST year around. Seems that DST separates the clock controlled folks from the sun controlled folks when they hit the roads at the start of their day. Lessens traffic. Less wasting gas sitting in a back up. That is one aspect that never occurred to me.

Martin - That's a very interesting link. Thanks for posting it.

Okay, there's another "wrinkle in time" for the U.S. this year. The income tax deadline is not April 15; nor is it April 16 as sometimes happens (and as many of the preprinted 2007 forms say). It's April 17. This is due to a fairly new and therefore little known holiday in the District of Columbia called Emancipation Day. Yep, the whole country is waiting for a holiday celebrated only in DC. (Not that anyone minds the delay, mind you.) See the link below for details.

The good news? I believe the U.S. government is allowing Easter to remain on Sunday.

Here is a link that might be useful: Internal Revenue Service News

Would you believe this? After getting a lot of complaints about the extra hour of evening sunlight in the hot weather we have been having in Western Australia, a compromise has been suggested. We will only have DST from October until December instead of March! Why bother at all?

Here in Massachusetts we often get an extra day to pay our taxes because Patriot's Day is a legal holiday here. Patriot's Day is the celebration of the anniversary of the Battle of Lexington and Concord in 1775. I fervently hope all American RP'ers remember Longfellow's poem that begins, "Listen my children and you shall hear--Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere--On the eighteenth of April in '75--Hardly a man is now alive--Who remembers that famous day and year--and the midnight ride of Paul Revere!"

Revere, who was captured by the Redcoats, and William Dawes, who actually got all the way thru, both shouting "The Regulars are coming! The Regulars are coming!", rode on the night of April 18th into the early hours of the 19th. The skirmishes and the "shot heard round the world" occurred April 19th. That has now moved to a Monday holiday and thus our typical tax reprieve in the Commonwealth.

Several years ago, I finally forced myself to get up at three in the morning and drive to Lexington Green to watch the re-enactment, which occurs in real time. As the first light barely lifts the darkness, you can hear the drums and cries of the Regulars as they march down Battle Road. I was surprised to feel my heart actually pounding. Even surrounded by excited schoolchildren, the scene is quite dramatic as shots ring out and Minutemen fall, one in the arms of his family whose house still stands nearby.

In full light several hours later, Regulars and Minutemen, citizen re-enactors and tourists, share pancakes at the various churches around the Green. Somehow, I was less grieved to pay my taxes that year.

Well, I'm in Western Australia and enjoying daylight saving. The weather is still the same no matter what the hour, daylight saving doesn't make the days any hotter, some opinions to the contrary :-). My husband, who installs TV antennas, is enjoying the fact that with daylight saving there is a little more time during the morning when it is cool enough to work in and on a roof without being turned into a crisp. There is also more light time in the evenings for finishing off jobs. I am enjoying the fact that I can get all our evening watering done while it is still light enough to see what I'm doing. My adult daughter enjoys that she can go to the gym in the evening and not come out to a dark car park.
Yes, we get up in the dark but we do that in winter anyway and its no big deal. Certainly it is easier dealing with businesses on the other side of the country (where a lot of the head ofices are based) with a two hour rather than a three hour time difference.

I really am hating this year's early time change. As columnist Richard Cohen recently pointed out, one man's decision has deprived us all of one beloved hour of early morning sunlight! Being a morning person, I resent the extra darkness thrust upon me so rudely and I can do little with the added on hour of sunlight at the end of the day, so it benefits me not at all....

One man's decision?

Perhaps Ed Markey, D-MA 7th Dist? Wikipedia: He is responsible for introducing legislation to change daylight saving time to begin on the second Sunday in March and end on the first Sunday in November starting in 2007. One of his reasons for doing this according to him was that it "puts a smile on everyone's face."

What an idiot

I just wish drivers in the dark, morning hours would remember to turn on their headlights. I've encountered several this week.

The time change this year has really left me dragging. I also miss that early hour of sunrise when I get up in the morning. Lucky for us, by the time the bus comes it is light and the kids are fine, but oh, it's so hard to face 6 a.m. in the dark again after a couple of weeks of early daylight!

The quote from Ed Markey made me laugh out loud, especially since there was a big article in the local paper a couple of days ago that mental health professionals had written letter after letter begging Congress not to extend DST since they were concerned that it would exacerbate the symptoms of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) for those who suffer from it. Evidently, it's morning light that eases the symptoms, not light in the evenings. They also pointed out the detrimental effects of toying with the human biorhythm.

Ginny, I think it was last year when Maryland taxpayers mailed our returns to Massachusetts and we, too, got your reprieve. I never understood why, really. If the returns have to be postmarked on the day they are due, they still aren't going to arrive before the Mass IRS folk go back to work.

For a lot of us in the eastern half of the various time zones, the extra hour of light in the afternoon and early evening is one of the high points of the year. When it's dark at 4pm, or even earlier in Maine, now you're talking depressed. At least when it's dark in the morning, you know the light is soon on its way, not 14 or more hours away. I say hooray for Ed Markey (on this one anyway).