It’s time to spring forward this Sunday for daylight saving time. Set clocks forward an hour tonight in a move that is meant to bring more sunlight to the day and save energy.
Daylight saving time officially started in the United States in 1918, but has gone through many revisions. The most recent revision in 2007 extended daylight saving time to save energy by increasing the hours of sunlight and reducing fuel use. Now, daylight saving time begins on the second Sunday of March and ends on the first Sunday of November.
Change your batteries
With the time change comes a reminder to change batteries in smoke alarms. Replacing batteries twice a year helps keep alarms at full working order.
A dose of advice for adjusting to change
Sleep experts say getting between seven and eight hours of ZZZ’s is critical to overall health.
Lack of sleep can lead to weight gain, heart problems and high blood pressure.
That’s why it’s important to adjust to daylight saving time and not let sleep patterns get out of whack.
The best advice is to go to bed at the same time and wake up at the same time.
Also, be aware of the time adjustment’s toll on the body.
“The Monday after the change there is a slight statistical increase in the number of accidents,” said Marianne Middleton, LMH Sleep Center coordinator. “It’s because people’s bodies just haven’t adjusted. They are driving drowsy.”
Experts say it generally takes two or three days to recover, but can take as long as a week. “This is the worst time change in the year,” Middleton said. “It’s bad.”
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olmsted78 (anonymous) says…
"It's bad...." Oh yeah, watch out for that horrific 1 hr time change. It's gonna be just terrible. At 2 AM I actually plan on entering a large hyperbolic chamber and transporting myself back in time an hour or so.
sundancewierdo (anonymous) says…
LOL Olmsted78!
groveslawnandhome (anonymous) says…
The best part of this article is the first comment...
Boston_Corbett (anonymous) says…
gub'mt plot.
number3of5 (anonymous) says…
So you need 7 - 8 hours of sleep. What do you think the changing around of the time twice a year does to your internal clock? It throws it out of whack for quite a while. I know it will take me about a month to become accustomed to the new time. It also upsets my pets. They don't have the same concept of time that we do, but they know when it is time to go out to the bathroom and if on DST it is 7:00 am, it is still 6:00 am to them and they won't want to go out for another half an hour or more. So, I'm with beobachter, quit all the switching and leave it where it is.
cheeseburger (anonymous) says…
Oh, puleezz!
VoiceOfReason (anonymous) says…
Normally I hate "losing" that hour. But I have to work a 12 hour shift tonight and that hour is going to make it go so much faster. Fall-back is a bad night to work. I need to check my schedule for that one.
Vinny1 (anonymous) says…
Number3of5 -
A month? For real? Grow up. A couple days and you're back to normal.
Have you ever flown coast to coast? Or gone overseas? Because that is a heck of a lot more time difference than a single hour.
KansasPerson (anonymous) says…
number3of5,
You must really love your pets if you built them their own bathroom.
:)
(Sorry, that euphemism has always made me smile for some reason.... especially when I'm pretty sure there's no actual "room" involved)
beatrice (anonymous) says…
Here in Arizona we don't bother with such nonsense. We thumb our noses at you foolish time shifters and leave our clocks alone.
thebcman (anonymous) says…
I'd rather suffer the time change than deal with your 120 degree heat ten months out of the year.
none2 (anonymous) says…
beatrice (anonymous) says…
Here in Arizona we don't bother with such nonsense. We thumb our noses at you foolish time shifters and leave our clocks alone.
===============
Actually, you aren't totally accurate. A significant chunk of Arizona does change to Daylight Saving time -- the Navajo lands observe Daylight Saving. The Hopi lands which are within side the Navajo lands do not.
riverdrifter (anonymous) says…
It's odd how the adjustment works for people. For me, it's basically one day. That first evening it's sort of odd. Then, so what. I can grill without a head lamp. All good.
none2 (anonymous) says…
number3of5 (anonymous) says…
So you need 7 - 8 hours of sleep. What do you think the changing around of the time twice a year does to your internal clock? It throws it out of whack for quite a while. I know it will take me about a month to become accustomed to the new time. It also upsets my pets. They don't have the same concept of time that we do, but they know when it is time to go out to the bathroom and if on DST it is 7:00 am, it is still 6:00 am to them and they won't want to go out for another half an hour or more. So, I'm with beobachter, quit all the switching and leave it where it is.
===================
Perhaps you need to see a medical doctor or get some group therapy if you have such a delicate internal clock. Granted standard time is a downer, but as a nation most of us can always look forward to Daylight Saving Time. I personally wouldn't mind year round Daylight Saving Time, but then there were always stories by anti-DST people claiming that school children are prone to get run over by bus drivers who cannot see them when it is dark.
KansasPerson (anonymous) says…
none2, don't forget they tried to have DST in the wintertime back in the 1970s. I think it was supposed to help with the "energy crisis." I was just a kid, but yeah, I hated it. I was never that into dark winter mornings in the first place, and that made it even worse. Of course that might have had something to do with the fact that we had to get our own little butts to school, over a mile away, with no bus picking us up or parents driving us.
What would it be like, on the other hand, to have plain old Standard Time year-round?
none2 (anonymous) says…
KansasPerson (anonymous) says…
none2, don't forget they tried to have DST in the wintertime back in the 1970s. I think it was supposed to help with the "energy crisis." I was just a kid, but yeah, I hated it. I was never that into dark winter mornings in the first place, and that made it even worse. Of course that might have had something to do with the fact that we had to get our own little butts to school, over a mile away, with no bus picking us up or parents driving us.
What would it be like, on the other hand, to have plain old Standard Time year-round?
==============
I hate standard time. I despise dark winter evenings after work when I'm very tired have things to do at home, errands to run, and everything has to be done in the dark. I know few people that run errands or do a lot of stuff before they go to work.
none2 (anonymous) says…
Its 5:46pm and still light! Its wonderful!
beatrice (anonymous) says…
none2, yes, you are correct about the Navajo nation and it's observance of the time shift. However, I don't live on the res. Where I live in Arizona, we don't bother with this nonsense.
thebcman, enjoying a 70 degree day today, which is near the weather for the last few months. It only really gets near 120 for a couple of months a year (when we really don't need an extra hour of sunshine). I'll still take it over below zero temps and snow for half the year. As I always say, you never have to shovel sunshine, and, we never have to worry about getting ticketed for not clearing our sidewalks in Phoenix.