Daylight Saving Time And The Most Important Clock To Reset

Before “falling back” to Central Standard Time last weekend, I thought about the extra hour that would be added to my day. Maybe the hour that I gained would be devoted to a special activity like my “Cocktail Hour” for Sauvignon Blanc sipping or the “Golden Hour” for photography

The “Daylight Saving Time Committee” suggested smoke alarm testing. (I know this because I read it on the Internet.)

I had smoke alarm testing nailed.

The DSTC must typically dine out or order in because I test my smoke alarm frequently. Just last month it alerted me to the salmon sauce that leaked onto the hot oven floor and blistered into smoke. The week before it warned me about the roasted cauliflower that went nuclear due to my mistimed multitasking. It did this while I engaged in a frenzy of magazine waving under the devices to clear the air with a backdrop of a squawking cockatiel who thought his flock was calling him to live free.

I sought a more existential leaning to my Sunday bonus hour. So I earmarked the sixty minutes to “Thinking About Important Stuff.” Pondering pestering questions ranging from IRA investments to plastic or metal eyeglass frames over several mugs of coffee appealed. Except I never got to it, there wasn’t any coffee.

The Cuisinart Coffee On Demand Programmable Coffeemaker, not as smart as my iPhone, iPad, and MAC, hadn’t synched with with DST. Demanding coffee was useless unless it brewed. I pushed the “brew” button and distracted myself with resetting the microwave and oven digital clocks. I jogged back and forth between the two until they coordinated.

Then I noticed a chill in the room and checked the thermostat.

The 62° nighttime setting hadn’t kicked into the 68° daytime setting. Resetting the thermostat timer involved a manual, flashlight, and a PhD. Choices for weekday and weekend time slots and temperature appeared. At one point I confused the AM with the PM, which would have kept me shivering by day and sweltering by night. Luckily by then the coffee brewed, and I demanded some. Since I temperature zoned the house I performed this miracle four times.

Caffeine worked wonders.

 

Needing a simpler task I wound the New Haven wall clock and swung the pendulum. Cranking the key was a bit Downton Abby. I felt powerful.

I ignored the battery-operated clocks. One had been banished to the backroom because it banged out the half hours inducing anxious thoughts like “It’s been thirty minutes, and I should have gotten more done!” Replacing the battery and resetting it would only have encouraged it.

 

 

The other, a half circle with Roman numerals, can’t be read at a glance. What’s the use? If I wanted to work at time telling I’d install a sundial.

 

I reset the clock radio and expect loud random static noises, like a specter’s attempt at communicating, to awake me at all hours until it’s fine-tuned. (It’s something about the AM and PM button on the bottom.)

My watches I’d reset when I wore them. One was numberless so it’s more of a ballpark time anyway. For instance I wouldn’t use it to time a poached egg.

 

 

My confusing car clock is so because it doesn’t look like it. I tapped into the tool section and before I knew it I reset the radio stations, changed the background, and programed revolving rainbow colors on the dials. I’ll drive around in my “car time zone” for weeks panicking when I glance at the clock and think I’m late. Then I’ll dig out my iPhone to check what time it REALLY is (which is probably illegal in Illinois).

In researching clocks I found another clock that’s not so easy to reset -the Dooms Day Clock. This symbolic clock ticks toward the likelihood of man-made global catastrophe (midnight). In 1947, a lab full of smart scientists established the clock. (Since some of these scientists worked on the Manhattan Project they knew about catastrophe.)

The clock has been set backward and forward 22 times. It’s now at 2 ½ minutes to 12. That’s not good.

The Science and Security Board warned that “The probability of global catastrophe is very high, and the actions needed to reduce the risks of disaster must be taken very soon.”

The report continues with “It is ever more important that senior leaders across the globe calm rather than stoke tensions that could lead to war, either by accident or miscalculation.” (I wonder who they’re talking about.)

The report also suggests that responsible citizens come forth and reset this clock away from midnight.

So here’s my suggestion. We should all write to Congress asking that they take away Donald’s Tweet account. Then I’ll wrap up my backroom banished clock and send it to the White House. There it will bang out every half hour and maybe Trump will think “It’s been thirty minutes, and I should have gotten more done!”

In the end I really DID spend an hour “Thinking About Important Stuff.”