Frugal Café Blog Zone

Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on November 1, 2009

Beautiful Arizona sunset | Photo taken by my colleague and friend, Gary Bang

We live in Arizona, so the time here remains the same year round. Likewise in Hawaii, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, and the Virgin Islands. But elsewhere in America, because of the genius of Benjamin Franklin, today is the day to set your clocks so that they “fall back” one hour.

By the way, the additional “s” after the word “saving” isn’t official, but colloquial. More people than not say “Daylight Savings Time” rather than “Daylight Saving Time.” (Like the lyric, “You say to-MAY-to, I say to-MAH-to…”). The term minus the letter “s” is the correct/government official term, but I agree with the masses… the term cries out for that extra “s.”

From ENCToday: Students safer, more coffee brewing as area falls back:

Say goodbye to sunlit evenings.

Unless you’re waking up Sunday in Hawaii, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, the Virgin Islands or Arizona, the end of daylight saving time means clocks “fall back” one hour.

Since 2007, daylight saving time ends the first Sunday in November — so “officially” at 2 a.m. Sunday clocks, should be turned back 60 minutes.

Wanda Oliver, of Surf City, doesn’t lose much sleep over the time change.

“Since I no longer work, it really doesn’t affect me much — I go by my own time clock now … and my dogs, of course,” said Oliver, who is retired.

Julian Wooten, a farmer in Jacksonville, said the time change won’t have much affect on his day-to-day operations.

Wooten mainly farms strawberries, blueberries and honeybees, said his fields have already been planted with strawberries and cabbage for the spring.

“It really doesn’t impact me at all except personally — until I get my biological clock reworked,” he said. “The bees don’t know a thing about (the time change).”

He says the wee hours of the morning are his favorite times.

“If I happen to wake up earlier than my usual time — 6 a.m. — then I’ll just go in and read. Waking up at 4 or 5 a.m. is my favorite time to read, mostly about honey bees, when it’s all quiet.”

Good background info on Daylight Saving Time (cough, Daylight Savings Time, cough) here:

From Oregon Live, ‘Daylight Savings Time’ 2009: History, controversy, and when to set your clock:

By Angela Webber, OregonLive.com

Daylight saving time (DST) ends this Sunday, Nov. 1 at 2:00 a.m. (or — should I say 1:00 a.m.?) when we get our extra hour of morning “daylight” back.

Official time turns from 1:59 a.m. back to 1:00 a.m. early Sunday morning, earning us an extra hour of sleep, and a brighter morning — though, in Oregon, I’m not sure we’ll notice.

Congress passed the most recent DST revision in 2007, which sets the dates for DST: It starts on the second Sunday in March and ends on the first Sunday in November.

The first daylight saving law went into effect in 1918, but no federal law actually requires states to observe the change; just, if they do, to do it at the same time as everyone else.

The clock-changing time (2:00 a.m.) was selected many years ago to cause minimal disturbance to late-shift workers and train schedules. It was also selected, instead of midnight, so that DST would not cause it to all of a sudden be “yesterday,” which could be quite confusing.

He who pays attention to the syntax of things…

Note: “Daylight saving time” is the correct way to spell it, though most people say “savings.” In fact, on the google trends this week, “daylight savings time” is trending while “daylight saving time” is barely getting any searches. Where did that ’s’ come from? (Another note: official Associated Press style used to require the hyphenation of “daylight-saving time,” but removed the hyphen last year. Maybe a change to the popular pronunciation is on its way?)

Does DST save energy? (no.)

States that observe DST (most, except Arizona and Hawaii) have for years assumed the accepted knowledge that daylight saving time saves energy. The institution of the 2007 DST regulations spurred a national debate and new scientific study of the topic.

In the summer, daylight saving time makes the sun set an hour later, reducing electricity uses for lighting and appliances in the evening, as we can stay outside later, and bedtime comes closer to sunset. When people wake up it is darker, which may make them use more lights, but this is offset by the shorter evenings.

[...]

International “Summertime”

About 70 other countries use daylight saving time for their own reasons, though they call it “summer time.” Most major industrial countries count themselves on this list, except Japan, India, and China.

Noteworthy information for bloggers, from No Runny Eggs:

This is the Emergency Blogging System. This is not a test; a test has questions.

For those of you in the US (and not in those parts that don’t observe Daylight Savings), Daylight Savings Time ended at 2 am local time today. If you have a WordPress blog (whether it is on WordPress.com, a WordPress stand-alone, or WordPress MU – this includes Blogivists and Conservablogs), and you had the time changed for Daylight Savings, you need to change it back to Standard Time (Central UTC -6, Mountain UTC -7, Eastern UTC -5, Pacific UTC -8, and check your clock for other locales). To do so, go into your wp-admin panel, select “Settings”, and under the “General Settings” page that pops up, select the right time zone. Don’t forget to hit “save” when you’re done.

Categories: Knowledge, Social and Political Climate
Tags: American Samoa, Benjamin Franklin, blogger, bloggers, change time, computer, Daylight Saving Time, Daylight Savings Time, fall back, first Sunday, Hawaii, November, Puerto Rico, set clock, set computer, Virgin Islands