It is almost 7:00 P.M. here in Chicago and it’s just beginning to get dark outside. Woo hoo! I know a lot of people are bothered by the change in the Daylight Savings Time rules, but living on the eastern edge of a time zone is such a drag! It hasn’t been light outside at 7:00 P.M. since October, maybe September.
Being on the eastern edge of a time zone means early sunrises and early sunsets. Being a nightowl means despising early sunrises and early sunsets. Being in Chicago means suffering through it. In the dead of winter the natural light is a distant memory by 5:00 in the afternoon. In the height of summer, it’s sufficiently dark for kids to play Ghost in the Graveyard at 8:30. Years ago a friend asked me where I’d live in the U.S. if I could move anywhere. I said I didn’t know because I hadn’t seen enough of the States to decide, but I would like to live on the western edge of a time zone.
So yes, setting the clocks last night was a hassle, but I’ll take the extra sunlight at the end of the day anytime! And kudos to all the people that spent time and money making sure the 3-week early switch went smoothly on all the computers around the world.
But one thing…as a long as the government forced this change, why didn’t they switch the shift from early Sunday morning to early Saturday morning…then we’d have two weekend mornings to adjust, not one.
When I lived in NH it would get dark very early in winter. I hated it and was complaining to one of the locals — he said he’d been in Maine the week before and it was starting to get dark at 3:30.
Ugh! Of course, in saying it’s dark by 5 here in the winter is to assume the sun came out at all…if often doesn’t in the winter. Any day the sun appears we’re all in better moods.
But t’is March now and that’s another story.