The Third Day of Thanksgiving

Good Morning Gentle Readers,

TWC is thankful that daylight savings time expired last night.

I'm no fan of DST, but It was pointless for the CONgress to stick us with another four weeks of DST in 2005. That dumb ass move cost the airline industry almost 150 million dollars and resulted in energy savings of pretty much zero. DST disrupts our sleep cycles, is hard on our hearts, and is linked to an uptick in car accidents. 

The lack of energy savings is intuitive. If it's still pitch black at 6:30 in the morning in late October, you're not saving any juice, you're just shifting the usage from evening to morning. And if it's pitch black at 6:30 here in the southland, what time does the sun come up in Seattle? 

Americans don't use electricity in the same way we used to. In July 1951 the family gathered around the Philco radio in the living room while a fan circulated hot, sultry air, providing the illusion of cooling. In July 2013 flat screens blare day and night, often competing for attention from several different rooms. The air conditioning might be set at an eco-friendly 70-something, but it still runs when it's hot outside. In 1951, an air conditioned home was virtually unheard of. 

Incandescent bulbs, radio tubes, and electric fans are orders of magnitude less energy intensive than a/c and plasma screens and whatever time the sun sets is only nominally related to energy consumption.

TWC changed all the clocks in the house except this one ^. It's twelve feet up on the wall. I gotta shove the couch outta the way, then stand tippie-toed on the top of the step stool to reach the knob on the bottom that moves the hands. Show of hands: Is manually setting a mechanical clock a lost art?   

I have several soft drink advertisement clocks, which were manufactured by the PAM Clock Company between 1950 and 1965. Each is a remnant of something that once was and cannot ever be again. I doubt I coined the term, but the clocks are a part of what I call Roadside Americana, the zenith of which lasted from the end of the Big War until the smog engine killed the muscle car.

All my mechanical clocks keep time better than the digital clock on the stove or the one in my truck. Go figure. 

As Ever,

TWC