Daylight Savings Mar 8, 2014

H

hardee

New member
OK, by now you've had time to go back and get the extra hour of sleep you lost last night, and to have noticed the time on your internet clock (yup , that little corner in the bottom right that keeps pointing out how long you have been here now) and the one on your wrist do not agree :roll: :disgust . Probably got the coffee pot set right though.

So for those of us who have to care what time it is, we had to move the clock forward in order to show up at work today, (yes there are some of us who do pull shifts on the weekend, and nights) and others who have to show up tomorrow, when that alarm goes off an hour before our body clock is ready yet.

There are considerable adverse affects that result from that sneaky little lost hour.

From the National Sleep Foundation in a published study done in 2008 we learned that during this nest week, there will be an increase in heart attacks above the average, by as much as 20%, and credited to increased stress due to the adjustment required to meet the new wake-up time.

"The Monday and Tuesday after moving the clocks ahead one hour in March is associated with a 10 percent increase in the risk of having a heart attack," says UAB Associate Professor Martin Young, Ph.D., in the Division of Cardiovascular Disease. "The opposite is true when falling back in October. This risk decreases by about 10 percent."

"Exactly why this happens is not known but there are several theories," Young says. "Sleep deprivation, the body's circadian clock and immune responses all can come into play when considering reasons that changing the time by an hour can be detrimental to someone's health."
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The whole article is here:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 162555.htm

There is also an associated increase in motor vehicle accidents. That increase is around 10% and it is due to the sleep loss of that one hour earlier rising.

"In addition to the rise in the risk of heart attacks, some have found that there is an increased rise in traffic accidents on the Monday following the beginning of DST. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that the change lead to an eight percent increase in traffic accidents.
"A lot of motorists don't realize that just the loss of one hour of sleep can throw your circadian rhythm out of wack, and as a result, the Monday after the switchover we see more crashes than the Monday before or the Monday thereafter," John Townsend, AAA Mid-Atlantic spokesman, said according to WAMU.

Read more: http://www.wjla.com/articles/2012/03/da ... z2vUiRdrEj
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Americans run an average of just over 6 hours per night, leaving them, by the end of the week, almost a full night short of their bodies natural sleep requirement. That is what makes that measly little "one hour loss" so significant.

This weekend, we change the clocks. We also need to be aware of our sleepiness, because it can affect our safety and it does affect our health. So, read this, and then go take a nap and if you have to get up in the morning to go to work, be sure and go to bed one hour earlier tonight so waking in the morning will come with that bright eyed, refreshed, ready to go feeling.

Good night,

Harvey (the Sleep Guy)
SleepyC:moon

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Thanks, Harvey. This site has lots of good advice, and not just about boating. Now, for us retired ones, we can just shuffle off to bed early without feeling guilty and (of course) sleep on in the a.m. if we remember to pull down the shade.

We just finished driving a total of 24 hours over the past few days, down and back to a different time zone, to visit good friends for 28 hours (many we haven't seen for thirty years) and arrived back to Colorado last night just in time to watch a g'daughter perform with her Daughters of Erin group before a very appreciative audience.

Your advice re sleep deprivation and what to do to avoid repercussions sure has been helpful for us. SO -- any time you want some geological info. let us know -- and we'll share what we can with you. Cheers - El and Bill
 
Daylight wasting time! Baxter and I were just starting to have daylight for our morning stroll! One of my ham friends suggested we should all just go to UTC, and the hell with whether it is light or dark, we would all know what time it was!
 
Thanks El and Bill,

You share here so often and it is always interesting. Sounds like you enjoyed your road trip, and made it home OK. Fun to get to see old friends and catch up.

So here comes my bed time for tonight so

Good night all,

Harvey (the sleepy guy)
SleepyC :moon

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hardee":207fpcjn said:
There are considerable adverse affects that result from that sneaky little lost hour.
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There are few things in life that get me more PO'd than Daylight Saving Time. I think it exists primarily to benefit commerce and if it were ever put to a popular vote would be roundly rejected.

But it ain't gonna happen so I am going to keep getting PO'd twice a year.

Warren
 
Doryman":p4tpzat1 said:
hardee":p4tpzat1 said:
There are considerable adverse affects that result from that sneaky little lost hour.
Click to expand...

There are few things in life that get me more PO'd than Daylight Saving Time. I think it exists primarily to benefit commerce and if it were ever put to a popular vote would be roundly rejected.

But it ain't gonna happen so I am going to keep getting PO'd twice a year.

Warren
Click to expand...
If I had it my way, we'd adjust the clock so the local sunset was around 9PM every day. I don't care if I have to go to work in the dark, but I'd like a little sunlight at the end of every work day. But my wish isn't gonna come true either. On the bright side, if Daylight Saving Time is one of the few things in life that really get's you PO'd, life is pretty good. :lol:

As an aside, I don't think it's strictly about commerce. Adjusting the clock does provide more daylight in the AM when kids are walking to school.
 
They are starting to have schools start later for other reasons so that may be solved soon enough in some areas. The history of the DST program is little publicized but it was originally about commerce and encouraging money to be spent and activities pursued after the average work day. The real kicker was that oil companies eventually figured out how much less gas we might buy given less daylight and you know how it goes from there. They still have a powerful lobby last time I checked so we are stuck with some form of the program for a while at least.

Greg
 
rogerbum":11tqe00l said:
Doryman":11tqe00l said:
hardee":11tqe00l said:
There are considerable adverse affects that result from that sneaky little lost hour.
Click to expand...

There are few things in life that get me more PO'd than Daylight Saving Time.
But it ain't gonna happen so I am going to keep getting PO'd twice a year.

Warren
Click to expand...
On the bright side, if Daylight Saving Time is one of the few things in life that really get's you PO'd, life is pretty good. :lol:

As an aside, I don't think it's strictly about commerce. Adjusting the clock does provide more daylight in the AM when kids are walking to school.
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I'm not quite sure why, but this exchange makes me think of Monty Python...

Some things in life are bad
They can really make you sad
Other things just make you swear and curse
When you're chewing on life's gristle
Don't grumble, give a whistle
And this'll help things turn out for the best...
And...

...always look on the bright side
of life...
(Whistle)

Always look on the light side
of life...
(Whistle)

If life seems jolly rotten
There's something you've forgotten
And that's to laugh and smile and dance and sing
When you're feeling in the dumps
Don't be silly chumps
Just purse your lips and whistle
- that's the thing.
And...always look on the bright
side of life...
(Whistle)
 
rogerbum":3dxdlew7 said:
If I had it my way, we'd adjust the clock so the local sunset was around 9PM every day. I don't care if I have to go to work in the dark, but I'd like a little sunlight at the end of every work day.
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My preference is the same as yours. In fact if it were up to me, I wouldn't mind if it stayed light until midnight! (But I realize I'm not the only person in the world.)

I did find one "gotcha" when I moved to the mid-Atlantic. Up north, where I'm from, the best weather is mid-summer, and at that time of year it stays light the latest (and there are nice, long twilights). So there was always lots of good daylight time after work to do stuff outside.

In the mid-Atlantic, summers were *really* hot and muggy, and even at peak time it still got dark at around 8:30 p.m. (as opposed to nearly 10:00 p.m.), and there is not a whole lot of twilight. Then to make it worse, when the weather was really nice out (late fall/early spring) it was getting dark even earlier (6-something), so there was basically no "fun outside" time on weekday evenings at the best times of year. Bummer that! (And something I had never thought of back home.)

Granted, there were also not long stretches of below-0º-F weather and days ending at 3 p.m. - up north isn't perfect either.
 
DST has almost no effect on a retiree like me. However, I remember the first gas crisis, circa 1973, I believe, when we kept DST all year, with some peculiar rationale I can not recall. What I do remember is that it sucked in the morning, going to work in full darkness, herding students and chasing gear needed for that 8 am class from building to building. Bad enough it rained a lot, but to have full dark early in the day was depressing.

Be fine with me if we kept Standard Time all year. Arizona does it. Dunno why each state can not opt for it.
 
As to schools starting later. That makes very good "sleep" or physiologic sense. Kids up to and through high school ages are not wired to go to sleep early. Even though they need up to 10 hours of sleep, their sleep switch does not chemically activate as early as an adults, consequently they aren't ready to go to sleep until around 10 to 11, making wake up a at 9 in the morning a more natural time for the school agers to be bright and alert.

DST, yup, lots of plusses and minuses and there will never be a full agreement on whether it should be stay or go.

I like the idea of a perpetual 9 pm sunset, and 5 am sunrise. In a perfect world, maybe, or just take it like it is and either be PO'd or not. Guess that would be your choice.

Mean time, "Here Comes the Sun"

Harvey
SleepyC
 
When told the reason for daylight savings time, the Old Indian said, "Only the government would believe that you could cut a foot off the top of a blanket, sew it to the bottom, and have a longer blanket,"

:-) M
 
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