Spring forward, and stop whining

Five years have passed since I last defended my old friend daylight-saving (not “savings”) time. Today I present one of my all-time favorite stories about this semiannual twisting of timepiece stems. The following story was confirmed as true by darwinawards.com, a fun-loving bunch that claims to “commemorate those who improve our gene pool by removing themselves from it.” Behold the 1999 Darwin Awards Winner:

Israel’s leaders wanted to start daylight-saving time a week early in 1999 to accommodate pre-sunrise prayers. Palestinians resisted the change, and a great confusion swept over the land. On Sunday, Sept. 5, two car bombs exploded simultaneously in different cities, killing three terrorists. At first, it was dismissed as clumsy bomb-making, but a closer investigation revealed the terrorists had been confused about the time change. According to the Darwinians, “the cars were still en route when the explosives detonated, delivering the terrorists to their untimely demises.” I believe this is known among terrorists as the “Lethal D’oh!” and falls a bit short of the threshold for martyrdom.

Through the years it has become clear to me that DST was invented for one simple reason: to accommodate chronic complainers who are running low on inventory. Twice annually we restock these status-quo worshippers with a new reason to grumble and wail.

One of the greatest concentration of these Hounds of Whinerville is in Arizona, the land of incessant contrarians. This is the only state in the continental United States that rejects DST. (Hawaii is the only other state.) The late radio commentator Paul Harvey — God rest his soul — was an Arizonan who championed the crusade against DST. Whether you love or hate DST, you really ought to go along with it just to avoid the hassle that noncompliance brings. For example, many people mistakenly believe that Arizona is on Pacific Daylight Time in the summer. But, technically, the state remains stuck on Mountain Standard Time, too stubborn to conform with 48 other states. Consequently, other Americans don’t know — and don’t care — if Arizona is in the Pacific or Mountain time zone. (Imagine the time travails of flying from Phoenix to LA to Honolulu.)

Dizzying time-zone rules

But there’s more confusion for the hapless desert dwellers. The Navajo Nation (the more enlightened Arizonans) observes daylight-saving time to conform with Utah and New Mexico, where the tribal lands also extend.

And there’s even more confusion. The Hopi Nation, surrounded by the Navajo reservation, follows the rest of Arizona and remains on standard time. This is why most Arizonans have tossed their clocks into closets and now ascertain time of day by staring at the sun.

“Experts” offer conflicting advice about DST. The National Sleep Foundation quotes Dr. Joseph Espiritu: “At the very least, on Saturday night (before DST begins), get to bed an hour early. If you vary your sleep time by one hour or so, there’s not much impact on your health.” On the other hand, Health & Medical Breakthrough News quotes Dr. Mark Aloia: “If your normal bed time is 11 o’clock, then go to bed at 11 o’clock on Saturday. Don’t try to make up that hour right away. There is a good chance you will lay there not being able to fall asleep, and that could be the trigger for insomnia.”

Other researchers insist DST does or does not increase energy savings, does or does not increase traffic accidents and does or does not increase health problems or save lives. And other experts tell us we’re supposed to use DST changes as reminders to check our smoke-alarm batteries and check our emergency stockpiles of food and water.

The only argument against DST that makes any sense to me is that it hurts business at drive-in movies. (Kids, ask your parents what those are.) But since there aren’t any drive-ins left these days — and since I love golfing after work, gardening in the evening, barbecuing before it gets dark and walking after supper — I’ll keep defending DST as a valuable piece of Americana … if not a valuable piece of Arizonana.

John Laird is The Columbian’s editorial page editor. His column of personal opinion appears each Sunday. Reach him at john.laird@columbian.com.