Daylight Savings Time

A bill (HR 2095) adding five weeks to Daylight Savings Time was passed by the House and sent to the Senate on a vote of 240 for and 157 against. Daylight time would begin four weeks earlier, on the first Sunday in April, and end one week later, on the first Sunday in November. Supporter Edward Markey (D-Mass.) said this would save energy, cut crime, spur commerce, reduce highway deaths, benefit persons afflicted with night blindness, and make "trick or treating . . . a little safer for children."

Today is one of the most dangerous days of the year -- and the onset of daylight saving time is to blame. Though it began on Sunday, researchers have found the most acute effects occur on the first Monday after clocks spring forward. That's when about one-fifth of the world's population is forced to get up and go to school or work one hour earlier than their bodies are used to. (Unlike on Sunday, there's no option to just sleep in.)  Losing a single hour may seem trivial in the scheme of things, but medical researchers have spent a good amount of time investigating some of the health consequences of switching to daylight saving time.

Rather than complex bailouts or irritating rate hikes, there's a simpler way to ease California's energy crisis, says a state senator from Long Beach. The clock. Democrat Betty Karnette introduced a resolution Monday asking Congress to give California the option of remaining on daylight saving time all year instead of turning back clocks in the fall. Californians would have an hour more of sunlight a day and would use less energy around peak hours, which fall about 6 p.m., Karnette said.

Here's another reason to celebrate as you look ahead to Saturday night and the rest of your weekend: Daylight saving time ends. That's right, you get an extra hour of shut-eye this weekend. Technically, the change occurs at 2 a.m. Sunday. But if you're like the rest of us, you'll push the clocks back one hour before you go to sleep Saturday night. (Remember: "Spring forward, fall back. ") The switcheroo began as part of the nation's efforts to save energy, although some critics say it's a hassle that doesn't end up saving that much power.

Daylight savings time: an oxymoron. JAMES R. PRATLEY Rancho Bernardo

If California is so concerned about conserving electricity, why don't we go back to daylight savings time? DON DANIELSON Huntington Beach

Daylight Savings Time ends Sunday at 2 a.m. Because many people wait until Sunday morning to set their clocks and VCRs to Standard Time, the TV listings in today's Calendar Section and Sunday's TV Times won't reflect the time change until 6 a.m. Sunday.

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art will celebrate the arrival of daylight savings time and publicize the little-known fact that the museum is open on Friday nights until 9 p.m. with a special event tonight from 5-9. All of the museum's galleries and special exhibitions will be open. Docent tours of the exhibitions will be given at 7. Parking is free after 5 p.m. in the Wilshire Boulevard lot.

I am doing research for a book and would like to hear from anyone who was born on July 29, 1937, between 3:38 p.m. and 3:42 p.m. (Mountain Time); April 12, 1960 between 3:17 a.m. and 3:21 a.m. (Pacific Time); or on July 11, 1961, between 1:44 p.m. and 1:48 p.m. (Pacific Time). I do not know whether Daylight Savings Time was in effect, so there could be an additional hour difference when comparing with other time zones. MARGARET COOK, P.O. Box 1051, Foresthill, CA 95631

Daylight saving time starts this weekend, as it does at roughly this time every year. It's when we "spring forward" one hour with the clocks so we can enjoy more sunshine at the end of the day. Sounds like a perfectly good thing, right? As benign as it might seem, daylight saving time has a dark side. Although many people quickly acclimate to the change, others suffer sleep setbacks, anxiety, missed appointments, even car accidents as a result. In extreme cases, they can spend days feeling as if something is "off," experts say. The jet-lag feeling will pass in time, said Helena Schotland, a clinical assistant professor of medicine at the University of Michigan and a researcher at the school's sleep disorders laboratory.

Daylight saving time begins this weekend. From coast to coast, most Americans will dutifully "spring forward" by one hour early Sunday morning. We're told this helps save energy and allows us to enjoy more sunshine during the summer months. But a number of critics say this is all a big fat waste of time. Daylight saving time does nothing but create chaos and confusion, they say, and might actually waste more energy than it tries to save. It should be abandoned immediately, they contend.

Daylight saving time is set to end Nov. 6, which supposedly is good for our body clocks (more sleep) but bad for those of us who don't want to let go of summer -- or at least not those long summer days. But these places flat-out don't crank the clock back an hour to standard time: Arizona (except the Navajo Indian Reservation), Hawaii , American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Add Saskatchewan, Canada, to the list too. The time change means that on Nov. 6, the sun will set at 4:57 p.m. in Los Angeles, 5:31 p.m. in Phoenix and Saskatoon, Saskatchewan; 5:50 p.m. in San Juan, Puerto Rico, and 5:53 p.m. in Honolulu.

Japanese officials are considering introducing daylight saving time to help cope with severe power shortages that likely will last for months. Japan has resisted daylight saving time for nearly 60 years, dumping the practice after the U.S. occupation ended. While Japanese politicians have attempted to bring back daylight saving time in recent years, skeptics have feared it would just keep workers in their offices longer. But according to Kyodo News agency, Japanese industry minister Banri Kaieda said bringing back daylight saving time may help avoid major blackouts in the summer, when energy consumption peaks because of scorching temperatures.

Daylight saving time is almost here. Yes, much of the nation switches over to daylight saving time at 2 a.m. Sunday. That makes many people happy -- or, rather, they think it does. Sure, folks can enjoy a bit of lingering daylight before turning on the TV after dinner. But some research suggests the time change may not be all it’s cracked up to be. It might – just might, we’re not saying it does – increase your risk of having a heart attack or attempting suicide . More to the issue perhaps is that the mornings will be darker.

Daylight saving time ends this weekend in the United Kingdom, where the Brits will turn back their clocks one hour at 2 a.m. Sunday morning. But Mayer Hillman wishes they wouldn’t. Preserving that extra hour of daylight at the end of the day would make it a whole lot easier for people to go outside and engage in some physical activity – something that would improve public health, he argues in an essay published Thursday in the British Medical Journal. Hillman, a senior fellow emeritus at the University of Westminster’s Policy Studies Institute in London, has been making this argument for quite some time.

In the land of the rising sun, no one can seem to agree on when it does. Rise, that is. Or set, for that matter. This summer, thousands of people here on Hokkaido island switched to daylight saving time, with the idea that they'd start work an hour earlier and get off in time to enjoy the long summer evenings. (More on why that didn't work out later.) But thousands of others here didn't make the switch.

Ever since World War I, our government has been intermittently messing with our sleep patterns, forcing Americans to get up in the dark every spring. Has all this early rising made us healthy, wealthy and wise, as Benjamin Franklin, who wrongfully gets most of the credit (and the blame) for inventing daylight saving time, suggested? Don't count on it. And don't count on saving any energy either.