Daylight Saving Time

This weekend it happened again.That dreaded time of year. Time to “Spring Forward” and lose an hour of sleep. Well, I know I certainly did. Between trying to trick my body into going to sleep an hour earlier and waking up at what felt like an hour earlier, I’m struggling today.

Most people think DST was started by farmers but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Farmers were actually against it from the very beginning. The time change really messed with their work schedule. They couldn’t harvest hay at the earlier time because it was still wet with dew and they had other activities that couldn’t be performed until temperatures dropped after the sun went down.

DST was started by businessmen around the time of WWI. It was an effort to save energy (coal) that be put toward the war effort.

WWI-era ad promoting Daylight Saving Time

Our family at AlaMow hopes your family uses the extra hour of daylight this summer to get outside after work and school. Play in the yard, plant some flowers, take a walk. We’re paying for it this morning but hopefully we’ll all be able to reap the rewards soon.

Groundhog Day

Today is February 2, also known as Groundhog Day. Tradition states that if Punxsutawney Phil comes out of his little hidey-hole and sees his shadow, we’ll get an early Spring. If not, we get 6 more weeks of Winter.

But a lesser known fact is that this tradition started around the German Christian holiday of Candlemas. Candlemas is the celebration of Jesus’s presentation in the Temple and some cultures don’t remove their Christmas decorations until this day.

The Groundhog came into this in a bit more obscure way. A group of friends in Pennsylvania went searching for a Groundhog on Candlemas back in the early 1800s and the next thing you know, Groundhog Day was born.

The groundhog’s shadow became related to the weather forecast through a poem that says

“For as the sun shines on Candlemas Day,
So far will the snow swirl until May.
For as the snow blows on Candlemas Day,
So far will the sun shine before May.”

Whether or not Phil’s predictions are accurate, I think is just a fun holiday. The Groundhog Club waits all year for this so the least we can do is get excited about it!

Here are some more facts about Groundhog Day. I find it particularly interesting that Phil is about as accurate as a meteorologist. I wonder what James Spann has to say about that.