Daylight savings time is an unneccessary evil
(Shirley Smith)
Remember to turn your clocks forward one hour on Sunday at 2 a.m., or you will get to your first class late. I don’t know about you, but I’ve always had a fear of doing this, knowing I would be the only one to do so and everyone would make fun of me.
Daylight savings is a time honored tradition, but it is also an uneccessary evil.
My grandfather lived on a small farm in the midwest and never changed his clock for daylight saving time (DST). I asked him once why he didn’t change his clock.
“I feed my livestock every morning at the same time,” he said. “Why should I change my clock? Them cows don’t know what time it is.”
Well, I couldn’t argue with that now could I?
Arizona and Hawaii are the only U.S. states, that do not observe DST. But even though Arizona does not observe DST, the Navajo Indian Reservation, which takes up most of northeastern Arizona, does. To add to the confusion, the Hopi Indian Reservation, which is wholly enclosed within the Navajo Reservation, does not observe DST. Confused? Me too. Why can’t they all just do it or all not do it?
“I like it because I take the bus home and when it stays light out,” Kierra Hutchinson, 19, undecided said. “I don’t have to be so nervous walking home in the dark.”
The proper spelling is not saving(s) time, which is how I have always spelled it. No, it is saving time. And something else to ponder is that no time is actually saved. It is only being shifted. So to be accurate, it should be called daylight shifting time.
2 a.m. on Sunday was chosen, because it is less disruptive even to night shifts. But one area that is affected more is the bars and nightclubs. Most states require these businesses to stop serving alcohol from 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. In the spring, turning the clock forward was no problem, but in fall, turning the clock back did. So, they just t turn them back at 1:59 a.m. Presto! Problem solved.
“When it gets dark earlier, I just feel more tired,” Neda Shahrestani, 18, marketing said. “I’m a cheerleader for my all star team and have to practice at night.”
DST began with Benjamin Franklin to save energy, over a hundred years ago. There is some controversy over this. I am one of the few people that would rather stay on standard time. As much as I enjoy having the extra light, here in California, our summers are extremely hot. This means that I need to run my air conditioner even longer, therefore I use more energy.
“What I don’t like about it is losing that extra hour of sleep in the morning when I have to work the next day,” David Taylor, 20, film production said. “I do enjoy having a longer day as far as daylight is concerned.”
I think it’s all backwards. If we had standard time in the summer, the sun would go down sooner so we could cool off faster. Then we should have DST in the winter, when we could benefit from the sun staying up later and warm us longer. But don’t worry, I think it is here to stay, because now it starts a month earlier and back to standard time a month later than it used to end.
Definition of daylight saving time:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/daylight+savings+time?s=t
On time zone:
Web exhibits:
http://www.webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/b2.html