Living abroad and this being so much less extreme really let sink in how much I hate this 😭
For all the people who don’t understand how time works.
Noon is supposed to be at 12:00. Let’s say someone lives in a place where that is literally true. If they lived on the equator then sunrise would be at 6 am and set at 6 pm. If it is the equinox anywhere on the planet would be sire at 6 am and set at 6 pm.
If they are far enough north or south that the shortest day is 10 hours or less, then the sun will rise at 7 am and set at 5 pm. This includes most of the US and Europe. The sun setting at 5 pm during the winter is normal.
The primary issue, at least in the US is that the typical workday of 9 to 5 or 8 to 5 has 5 hours in the afternoon and only 3 or 4 hours in the morning. Being afternoon heavy means getting dark at 5 seems early, especially after the stupid DST shift making it seem like evenings should have even more sunlight. We basically changed society based on banking hours and are angry that time works the way it does and instead of just shifting working hours to what we want we pretend that the sun is the highest in the sky at 1:00 pm for part of the year for no logical reason.
Getting dark at 5? Lucky.
This includes most of the US and Europe. The sun setting at 5 pm during the winter is normal.
Most of the US is considerable more to the south than Europe. Remember that Naples, a city in the south of Europe, is on the same latitude as New York City, as city in the Northern part of the US. So you can’t easily transfer experiences regarding this from one to the other.
It is just dark in the winter in large parts of Europe, and no amount of clock fiddling is going to change that.
Shortest day is like 6 hours here.
Even high schoolers don’t see daylight, let alone people with jobs.
It’s horrible
I find it much more dispiriting to come home in the dark, than to get up in the dark. So yeah I like “daylight savings time” more in practice. People arguing noon is sun at highest point aren’t arguing that 6 is sunrise and 6 is sunset, we don’t use sundials anymore.
I’d be good with a world time. Just decide when a day starts worldwide and let local schedules be whatever works. So maybe the sun rises at 0100 in my longitude and so work starts at 4 or whatever. There’s no magic to the 12 being noon.
I used to think this too, but using a global time means the date also ticks over to the next day at odd moments during the day. So in the end it feels like timezones with extra confusion.
The cold is fine. The short days absolutely suck.
Personally, I just lean into it. I get up at 04:00 so that I want to go to sleep by 20:00 at the latest. The bears have it figured out. Extra bonus is that watching late night TV early in the morning doesn’t feel as unproductive.
…i cannot agree with Ted Cruz, he wants it permanent, fuck that…
Next month it will be 4:00. Ugh.
Already 4 here, anywhere not on the coast is in a valley so the functional susnet is even earlier.
I hope you guys never get mosquitoes there, because it mean mosquitoes time is now 4pm.
Not many mosquitos when it’s -20C.
lol, it’s 5:24 here and I was just thinking about this before I ran across this comic.
God try being in Northern Ireland, get goes from black to dark gray about 10.00 then goes from gray to back to black about 15.00. It’s so depressing
I’ve got to wake up an hour earlier than normal all week so I really appreciate everyone changing their clocks for me.
I have a summer seasonal affective disorder. I know it’s a bit controversial diagnosis, but I absolutely have a terrible time during summer. It’s so bad I start to be increasingly anxious about summer by the end of February because I know it’s slowly approaching.
I find daylight to be pleasant like everybody, but after a very short time I start to feel drained as if it was too much. I like cloudy days or when it rains. During summer, I basically don’t sleep. Even when the heat is not an issue I just can’t sleep.
Lately I’ve been smiling and laughing more and more; I feel much more at peace. It’s always strange to finally feel energized and genuinely happy when most people around me feel the complete opposite.
This is me, though I figured out a while ago it’s better if I just ignore Daylight Savings.
My inner clock doesn’t “switch”. There’s no change. There’s just half the year where I’m up an hour earlier and forcing myself to bed earlier and it completely fucks my energy cycle.
I’m similar. Definitely way more sluggish and depressed in summer, and my sleep is very poor even if I control the temperature. I enjoy rain and darkness. I prefer night shift. Autumn is my favorite because summer is finally over and it’s the longest time before summer comes again, plus it has the best holidays. I sleep best in winter and I’m more productive, energized, and happy.
But unlike SAD, it’s a lot harder to fix than just getting a sun lamp. I already do sleep in as dark a room as I can get during the day, but it’s never enough. Though the few times I’ve had access to a truly pitch black room to sleep in, it’s been really helpful.
It’s a weird way to be and most people really don’t understand.
I feel for you. Although I never got an actual diagnosis, I am fairly sure I have traditional SAD. It doesn’t make a lot of sense, because I handle cooler temps better than warm ones, but I guess it’s a sunlight exposure thing.
I knew someone who claimed that light therapy helped. I don’t know much about it, in your case it might be worth a short. Some people talked about melatonin, but I don’t think it helps that much if at all (but that’s just based my own experience).
In any cases, I hope this winter won’t be too hard on you this year.
Thank you. I bought a light therapy lamp years ago. I will have to find it.
And then you go to the Arctic circle, look outside in summer, see daylight, see 12:00 on the clock and have no idea which 12 it is…
Presumably the hint there would be where the sun was coming from. In the south, noon. In the north, midnight. Just, uh, like 6 and 6 during the summer. East, am. West, pm.
That’s why I love 24 hr time keeping
that’s the devil’s timekeeping
It’s the one thing I just never get used to. Everything else about seasons etc. has stopped being surprising and anything more than “oh, this is happening again”, but it never stops feeling unreal that it gets dark so damn late in the morning and early in the afternoon.
As a critter of the night, this is my favorite time of the year. <3
Work and school schedules could be adjusted to adapt so we’re not “going to work in the dark”. They could be, and probably everyone not getting rich off virtual slave labor would fine with that.
With the switch to standard time, I now go to work in the dark, and go home in the dark. How are you going to fix that?
Shorter work days.
