This Sunday is My Favorite Sunday of the Year

I can't wait to get that extra hour of sleep this Sunday morning as we "fall back" for Daylight Saving Time. But do we really need Daylight Saving Time anymore?

Why did daylight saving time start? Some people believe it was started to help farmers and ranchers have more daylight to do their farming and ranching. As a kid who grew up on the farm, I can tell you that’s all bull crap (no pun intended) We woke up with the sun, no matter what time our alarm clock said, so it was a pain in the farming behind to have to change our clocks twice a year.

OK let’s get this out of the way, it’s Daylight Saving time, singular, not plural. It drives me crazy when I hear someone mispronounce it.

Next, Daylight saving time officially began in the United States during World War I, primarily to save fuel and electricity by reducing the need to use artificial lighting. Although some states continued to observe the practice between wars, it wasn’t officially observed nationally again until World War II.

I get we were helping the war effort, but why oh why, for the love of God do we still observe daylight saving time?

According to standardtime.com: “The Uniform Time Act of 1966 provided the basic framework for alternating between daylight saving time and standard time, which we now observe in the United States. But Congress can't seem to resist tinkering with it. For example, in 1973 daylight saving time was observed all year, instead of just the spring and summer. The system of beginning DST at 2 a.m. on the first Sunday in April and ending it at 2 a.m. on the last Sunday in October was not standardized until 1986. The rules changed again in 2007. DST now begins on the second Sunday of March and ends the first Sunday in November.”

Over the years, people like me, have called for the end of Daylight Saving time. I can put up with the falling back in November, but I absolutely hate hate hate springing forward in March every year.

And I’m not alone, doctors believe we will be less stressed, more rested and cause less accidents on the Monday after Daylight Saving time switches.  Statistics bear this out with statisticians saying that traffic accidents alone go up around 10% every year on the first Monday after the time change. It’s so weird how the same thing doesn’t happen in the fall when we are getting that extra hour of sleepy time.

And after all, there are already many areas of the US that already don’t observe Daylight Saving Time.  The states of Arizona and Hawaii don’t. Plus the US territories of American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.

Let’s do our own informal poll. Should the US get rid of Daylight Saving Time?