Time Change
I had an early start this morning and I totally forgot the time change.
I checked the time on my phone just to confirm how early it was. The automatic time change on phones is a lifesaver. I even have an analog clock in my office that handles it automatically.
But I had that moment when I looked at the non-updating clock on our stove. How the heck did I lose that extra hour...
Oddly enough, Daylight Saving Time started close to home for me. Today I learned that Port Arthur, one of the cities that was later amalgamated to form my home town of Thunder Bay, Ontario, was the first city in the world to adopt it.
This clears up a mystery from my childhood. I was raised on the Fort William 1 side, and my family was very proud of it. My mom talked about the time when Port Arthur was in a different (and therefore wrong) time zone.
When the original time change happened, both Fort William and Port Arthur sprang forward, but Port Arthur didn't spring back. Fort William did, so for five months it was probably very confusing if you had an appointment in the other city.
They schedule time changes at 2 a.m. so most sleep through it. However, I had a bit of a career working in Alarm Monitoring Centers. They have to run 24 hours a day, so you have to work your share of nights.
I worked weekends when I was a student during the week, alternating days and nights. so I got to observe time changes first hand. It's kind of a strange experience, expecially working in a place where everything is time stamped.
When it springs forward, you just have an empty, non-existent hour. But when it falls back, you have to loop back through that hour again.
So, I've always been facinated with time changes. But given the distruption to people's lives, I don't think the are a great policy. In 2020, Ontario passed the Time Amendment Act which officially moves the province to permanant daylight savings time. The date this is implemented was left blank, to be announced by the Lieutenant Governor. This is to ensure that we align with Québec and New York State. But maybe we want to just do it on our own.
These time changes always mess me up.
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